The US’s top diplomat Blinken is embarking on a Middle East trip this week, and will visit Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Israel and the occupied West Bank.
State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Blinken will discuss with Israeli officials ensuring sustained humanitarian access to Gaza, the next phase of the war, protecting civilians and “how to enable Palestinians to return to their homes and neighbourhoods as fighting curtails”.
Nearly two million people in Gaza – more than 80 percent of the territory’s population – have been forced out of their homes. So far, Israeli forces are preventing residents from returning to their neighbourhoods in the north, even as Israel withdraws thousands of troops from Gaza.
The State Department’s nod to the issue comes days after Washington rebuked calls by Israeli officials to drive Palestinians out of Gaza in what legal experts say would amount to ethnic cleansing – a crime against humanity.
Still, with much of northern Gaza destroyed, it is not clear how people will be able to return or whether Israel will allow reconstruction in the territory.
Source: AlJazeera
