US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced this Thursday that his country has presented a draft resolution to the UN Security Council for an “immediate ceasefire” in Gaza “linked to the liberation” of the 134 hostages still held by Palestinian militias in the Strip. The head of US diplomacy has assured that the Israeli team that will travel to the United States next week – led by Defense Minister Yoav Gallant – is studying “another way” to end Hamas without launching a “major ground invasion.” in the Rafah area, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu now admits will “take some time” to begin. Meanwhile, the Israeli army estimates that 140 militants were killed (50 in the last day) and 600 were arrested in a four-day raid on the Al Shifa hospital, in the capital of Gaza, and about whose interior there is hardly any information.
During the five and a half months of war, Washington has vetoed all ceasefire proposals presented to the UN Security Council, where it has a permanent seat. The formula now promoted by the Secretary of State would not imply the automatic end of the conflict. Washington does not ask Israel, to which it has been providing financing and weapons, and focuses its strategy on carrying out a truce agreement of a month and a half in its first phase (six times longer than the first, in November) that reduces tension. and have a domino effect: alleviate the serious humanitarian crisis in Gaza, prevent further contagion of violence to the West Bank and calm Israel's hot border with Lebanon, where the exchange of fire with Hezbollah and other militias is daily.
Blinken has been optimistic about a second truce agreement, which the parties are negotiating these days in Qatar. He has defined it as “very possible”, because “the differences have been reduced.” “It would bring immediate relief to so many people who are suffering in Gaza, children, women and men, it would allow much more humanitarian aid to reach them and it could create the conditions to have a lasting ceasefire, which is also what we want to see. It is the most urgent thing and we are putting pressure together with Egypt and Qatar,” he said in an interview in the Saudi city of Jeddah with the Arabic-language channel Al Arabiya. “We very much hope that countries will support it, it will send a powerful message,” he added. Likewise, he has considered it “imperative” that more help in Gaza and has indicated that it will be the “main focus” of his visit to Israel this Friday, a stage that was not part of the initial agenda.
According to the draft resolution, which the US delegation to the UN intends to be put to a vote this week – not before noon this Friday, according to diplomatic sources – the Security Council “determines the imperative of a ceasefire immediate and sustained to protect civilians on both sides; allow the delivery of essential humanitarian material and alleviate human suffering,” while supporting “all ongoing diplomatic efforts” to secure “that ceasefire in connection with the release of all hostages.” The text also emphasizes “the Council's full support for taking advantage of the window of opportunity created by any ceasefire to intensify diplomatic efforts (aimed at) creating the conditions for a sustained cessation of hostilities and lasting peace as established by the resolution 2720”, relating to the protection of the civilian population and the provision of immediate humanitarian aid to the Palestinians of Gaza, and approved by the Council last December.
The US draft resolution, the writing of which has taken more than a month with six successive versions although its final terms do not differ greatly from those formulated in other resolution proposals, also reiterates the call to all parties in the conflict to respect international law, including humanitarian law; and “the urgent need to expand the flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza civilians and the removal of all barriers” to the provision of sufficient aid, “in line with resolutions 2712 (on the creation of humanitarian pauses and corridors) and 2720″.
The announcement comes at a time of greatest tension with the Government of Benjamin Netanyahu, mainly around the announced invasion of Rafah and the Israeli obstacles to humanitarian aid, which have made Gazans the population with the fastest deterioration of their food security, at a speed never seen before in the world. Hundreds of thousands are on the brink of famine.
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Disagreement
Blinken has also referred to the incursion in Rafah, which has become a touchstone of the relationship and the red line that the international community is drawing towards Israel – including its main allies – after almost half a year of war that is close to 32,000 this Thursday. dead, with scenes of malnutrition, fights over food and entire neighborhoods destroyed. “What we don't want to see is a major ground operation in Rafah because we don't see how it can be done without causing great harm to civilians. But at the same time it is necessary to do something with Hamas, because it is nothing more than death and destruction for the Palestinians,” he noted.
This Wednesday, Netanyahu addressed the issue in a statement about the conversation he had two days earlier with the president of the United States, Joe Biden, the first in a month. “I told him: it is impossible to complete the victory without the army entering Rafah to eliminate the remaining Hamas battalions (…) There are times when we have agreed with our friends and times when we have not. In the end, we have always done what is vital for our security and we will do it this time too,” he said, recalling that he has already approved the operational plans for the incursion and that “soon” he will do so with the “evacuation” plans, that is, , the forced displacement of the 1.4 million Gazans displaced there, mainly due to the order he gave at the beginning of the war to evacuate the north. The raid itself will still “take some time” to arrive, he clarified.
The word “alternative” is increasingly heard together with the word Rafah. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin conveyed to Israel's Defense Minister in a telephone conversation the “need to consider alternatives to a major ground operation in Rafah,” according to the Pentagon.
Meanwhile, Israel has raised the number of dead militants to 140 (50 in the last day) and 600 arrests in the raid that began on Monday at the Al Shifa hospital, a large facility in the capital where it has positioned armored vehicles and shooters. Israel claims that they were hiding in the medical center, the largest in Gaza and which houses thousands of displaced people, patients and medical personnel, while Hamas claims that it is fighting in the surrounding area. Two Israeli soldiers have been killed in the clashes. “The operation in Al Shifa took the terrorists by surprise. “What we did at the beginning of the war in weeks, this time we achieved it in minutes,” the Minister of Defense boasted this Thursday.
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