RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken brought his diplomatic push on the Israel-Hamas war to the occupied West Bank on Sunday, meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as part of an intensifying Biden administration drive to reduce the suffering of Gaza’s civilians under Israeli bombardment and to start to sketch out a post-conflict scenario for the territory.
Blinken traveled through the West Bank city of Ramallah in an armored motorcade and under tight security. The trip came on the third day of an urgent new round of American diplomacy that is seeking to limit the destabilizing regional fallout from Israel’s war with Gaza’s ruling Hamas militant group.
The Biden administration, while remaining the strongest backer of Israel’s military response to Hamas’ attacks on Oct. 7, is increasingly seeking to use its influence with Israel to try to temper the effect of Israel’s weeks of complete siege and near round-the-clock air, ground and sea assaults in Gaza, home to 2.3 million civilians.
Blinken later flew to Baghdad for talks with Iraqi Prime Mohammed Shia al-Sudani as American forces in the region face a surge of attacks by Iranian-allied militias in Iraq and elsewhere. U.S. forces shot down another one-way attack drone Sunday that was targeting American and coalition troops near their base in neighboring Syria, a U.S. official said.
Blinken’s meeting with Abbas in the West Bank came only hours after Israeli planes bombed a refugee camp in Gaza, killing at least 40 people according to health officials in Gaza.
Despite the secrecy and the U.S. State Department’s refusal to confirm Blinken’s West Bank trip until after he had left the Palestinian territory, Palestinians turned out to protest U.S. support for Israel’s war as word of his arrival spread in the West Bank. Demonstrators held signs showing dripping blood and with messages that included, “Blinken blood is on your hands.”
Neither Blinken nor Abbas spoke as they greeted each other in front of cameras and their meeting ended without any public comment.
The Palestinian Authority administers semiautonomous areas of the Israeli-occupied West Bank. It has not been a factor in the Gaza Strip since 2007, when Hamas seized control after winning in elections there a year earlier.
A senior American official traveling with Blinken stressed what the official said was the U.S. commitment to pressing Israel to protect civilians in Gaza, increase humanitarian aid supplies and rein in and punish surging violence by extremist Jewish settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank.
At least 150 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since the start of the war, mainly during violent protests and gun battles during arrest raids.
Blinken said the U.S. envisions the Palestinian Authority as “playing a central role” in any post-Hamas administration in Gaza, according to the senior U.S. official, who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity to detail the discussions.
Abbas, however, said the Palestinian Authority would only assume power in Gaza as part of a “comprehensive political solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to the Palestinians’ official WAFA news agency.
Abbas condemned Israel’s bombardment of Gaza as a “genocidal war” and urged Blinken “to immediately stop them from committing such crimes,” the new agency reported.
Blinken told Abbas the United States wanted to see humanitarian assistance getting to civilians in Gaza and the resumption of essential services in Gaza, the State Department said. Blinken also made clear that Palestinians must not be forcibly displaced, U.S. officials said.
The meeting with Abbas comes on what is Blinken’s second trip to the Middle East since Hamas’s surprise Oct. 7 attack in Israel, which killed more than 1,400 people. Blinken visited Israel and met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday before meeting in Jordan with Arab ministers Saturday.
At each stop, Blinken has offered firm U.S. support for Israel’s right to defend itself but also stressed that it must adhere to the laws of war, protect civilians and increase humanitarian aid supplies to Gaza. To do that, as well as to ease the flow of foreigners fleeing Gaza, he has made the case that Israel should implement rolling humanitarian pauses to its airstrikes and ground operations, something that Netanyahu has thus far flatly rejected.
The Arab foreign ministers with whom Blinken met in Amman – from Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates – issued the same demand. But Blinken said the U.S. would not push for one.
U.S. officials believe that Netanyahu may soften his opposition if he can be convinced that it is in Israel’s strategic interests to ease the plight of Palestinian civilians in Gaza. The soaring death toll among Palestinians — more than 9,700, according to officials of Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry — has sparked growing international anger, with tens of thousands from Washington to Berlin taking to the streets over the weekend to demand an immediate cease-fire.
Arab states are resisting American suggestions that they play a larger role in resolving crisis, expressing outrage at the civilian toll of the Israeli military operations but believing Gaza to be a problem largely of Israel’s own making.
When Blinken arrived in the Iraqi capital, he slipped on a khaki flak jacket over his dark suit before boarding a helicopter to fly from the airport to his first meeting at the U.S. Embassy.
The U.S. has deep concerns that Iran and its proxies, including several militia groups in Iraq, may take advantage of the situation in Gaza to further destabilize the Middle East. Already Iranian-backed militias have intensified rocket and other attacks on U.S. military facilities in Iraq and Syria, drawing at least one retaliatory strike from American forces.
Sunday’s attack by drone against a U.S. site in Syria was at least the 32nd on U.S. and coalition military facilities in Iraq and Syria since Oct. 17. To date there have been at least 17 attacks in Iraq and 15 in Syria. At least 21 service members have been injured by the attacks but all have returned to duty, the Pentagon said.
The same U.S. official who confirmed the U.S. shootdown of the drone said the drone strike was very similar to other recent attacks on U.S. personnel at bases in Iraq and Syria and is believed at this point to be linked to Iranian-backed militia. The official was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Since the Israeli-Hamas war erupted, U.S. officials have tried to deter any desire by Iran or groups it supports, including Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Yemen’s Houthis and Iraqi militias, to join or exacerbate the crisis.
President Joe Biden has deployed two aircraft carrier strike groups to the eastern Mediterranean and the Bahrain-based U.S. 5th Fleet has been instructed to be on the alert.
