US Secretary of State Antony Blinken wrapped up a gruelling Middle East diplomatic tour after only limited success in efforts to forge a regional consensus on how best to ease civilian suffering in Gaza as Israel intensifies its war against Hamas.
In the Turkish capital, Ankara, Blinken met with Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan following a frantic weekend of travel that took him from Israel to Jordan, the occupied West Bank, Cyprus and Iraq, to build support for the Biden administration’s proposal for “humanitarian pauses” to Israel’s relentless military campaign in Gaza.
“All of this is a work in progress,” Mr Blinken said before leaving Turkey.
“We don’t obviously agree on everything, but there are common views on some of the imperatives of the moment that we’re working on together.”
Mr Blinken’s shuttle diplomacy came as Israeli troops surrounded Gaza City and cut off the northern part of the besieged Hamas-ruled territory.
Troops are expected to enter the city Monday or Tuesday and are likely to face militants fighting street by street using a vast network of tunnels.
Casualties will likely rise on both sides in the month-old war, which has already killed more than 10,000 Palestinians according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
The top US diplomat hopes that pauses in the war would allow for a surge of humanitarian aid to Gaza and the release of hostages captured by Hamas during the militants’ deadly October 7 incursion into southern Israel that killed more than 1,400 people, mostly civilians — while also preventing the conflict from spreading regionally.
“We’ve engaged the Israelis on steps that they can take to minimize civilian casualties,” Mr Blinken said before leaving Ankara.
“We’re working, as I said, very aggressively on getting more humanitarian assistance into Gaza.”
“We are very focused on the hostages held by Hamas, including the Americans, and we are doing everything possible to bring them home,” he added.
State Department spokesman, Matthew Miller, said in a statement both Mr Blinken and Mr Fidan “emphasised the importance of the longstanding US-Turkish cooperation as Nato Allies and Euro-Atlantic security priorities including Sweden’s Nato accession.”
Mr Blinken did not meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan who has been highly critical of Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and an outlier among Nato allies in not expressing full support for Israel’s right to defend itself.
As the Blinken-Fidan meeting got under way, dozens of protesters from an Islamist group waved Turkish and Palestinian flags and held up anti-US and anti-Israel placards outside the Foreign Ministry.
Police earlier in the day dispersed a group of students marching toward the ministry chanting “murderer Blinken, get out of Turkey!”
Also on Monday, about 150 people rallied outside the US Embassy in Ankara, carrying a large banner that read: “No to genocide!”
It was the second day of protests denouncing Mr Blinken’s visit.
On Sunday, pro-Palestinian protesters clashed with Turkish riot police outside the US-Turkish Incirlik military air base in the southern city of Adana.
Police fired tear gas and water cannon as the demonstrators tried to cross fields to enter the base.
Turkish officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the talks, said Mr Fidan had urged Mr Blinken to prevent the targeting of civilians in Gaza and their forced displacement, and also press for a “full ceasefire”.
Mr Blinken’s mission, his second to the region since the war began, has found only tepid, if any, support for his efforts to contain the fallout from the conflict.
Israel has rejected the idea of pauses while Arab and Muslim nations are instead demanding an immediate cease-fire as the casualty toll soars among Palestinian civilians under Israeli bombardments of Gaza.
US officials are seeking to convince Israel of the strategic importance of respecting the laws of war by protecting non-combatants and significantly boosting deliveries of humanitarian aid to Gaza’s beleaguered civilian population.
It remained unclear, however, if Mr Netanyahu would agree to temporary, rolling pauses in the massive operation to eradicate Hamas — or whether outrage among Palestinians and their supporters could be assuaged if he did.
Already Jordan and Turkey have recalled their ambassadors to Israel to protest its tactics and the tide of international opinion appears to be turning from sympathy toward Israel in the aftermath of October 7 to revulsion as images of death and destruction in Gaza spread around the world.
On Saturday in the Jordanian capital of Amman, both the Egyptian and Jordanian foreign ministers appeared at a joint news conference with Mr Blinken.
The two said Israel’s war had gone beyond self-defence and could no longer be justified as it now amounted to collective punishment of the Palestinian people.
That sentiment was echoed by tens of thousands of demonstrators who marched in the streets of world capitals over the weekend to protest Israel and condemn US support for Israel.
From Turkey, Mr Blinken headed to Asia where the Gaza conflict will likely share top billing with other international crises at a series of events in Japan, South Korea and India, including Russia’s war on Ukraine and North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme.
