US Secretary of State Antony Blinken briefed international media at the US Embassy on Tuesday following a whirlwind tour of the region visiting Israel’s neighbors.
Blinken and leaders of neighboring Arab states discussed the ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza, the escalating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the increasing threat to international shipping in the Red Sea from Iranian backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.
The Secretary expressed America’s strong support for Israel’s continued goals to eliminate Hamas in Gaza, rescue all the hostages kidnapped on October 7th by the terror organization, and to ensure “the day after” that Gaza will never again pose a threat to the Jewish State.
All that being said, however, Blinken nevertheless reiterated the Biden Administration’s ultimate goal of forcing the Jewish State to accept an unrealistic — in fact, impossible — “two-state solution” that would see the establishment of another terrorist state on Israel’s borders.
In response to a question from an Al Jazeera journalist (this news outlet is a mouthpiece for the Qatari government and has intimate ties with the Hamas terrorist organization), Blinken said:
“We want this war to end as soon as possible. There’s been far too much loss of life, far too much suffering.
“But it’s vital that Israel achieve its very legitimate objectives of ensuring that October 7th can never happen again. We believe they’ve made considerable progress toward that goal.
“At the same time I think it’s very important to remember that everyone has choices to make and that includes Hamas.
“Hamas could have ended this on October 8th by not hiding behind civilians, by putting down its weapons, by surrendering, by releasing the hostages.
“None of the suffering none of the suffering would have happened if Hamas hadn’t done what it did on October 7th and had it made different decisions thereafter, so it’s very important to keep that in perspective.
“And again, this could end tomorrow if Hamas makes those decisions.
“We will continue as we’ve done, to give the Israelis our best advice about conducting this war in a manner that achieves the objective of making sure that October 7th can’t be repeated, does better by protecting civilians, and making sure that people get the assistance that they need.
“With regard to normalization, I think there is clear interest in pursuing that. Integration of the region is something that virtually all of the countries that I visited on this trip want to advance, want to pursue.
“Some of them have already taken vital steps to do that; others I think are interested in doing the same.
“But it’s equally clear that that’s not a substitute for or at the expense of a political horizon for the Palestinians and ultimately a Palestinian state. On the contrary, that piece has to be a part of any integration efforts, any normalization efforts — that was also very clear in my conversations during the course of this trip, including with Saudi Arabia.”
