Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the pressure is on the Palestinian militant group Hamas to move forward with the cease-fire in the Gaza Strip, arguing the group’s support from its allies in the region has dwindled in recent months.
“Well look, we are encouraged because this should happen, and it should happen because Hamas is at a point where the cavalry it thought might come to the rescue isn’t coming to the rescue, Hezbollah not coming to the rescue, Iran not coming to the rescue,” Blinken said during his Thursday morning appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “It sought to have a wider war from day one.”
Blinken expressed optimism that a halt in fighting between Hamas and Israel could occur but cautioned that previous attempts to forge peace in the region have failed.
“In the absence of that, I think the pressure is on Hamas to finally get to yes. So we should be able to get there, but look, I think we also have to be very realistic. We’ve had these Lucy and the football moments several times over the last months where we thought we were there, and the football gets pulled away,” he said on Thursday.
Officials on all sides, including Israel’s defense minister, Israel Katz, have said the deal is closer than in prior instances. The cease-fire would be played out in multiple phases, including the exchange of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners, a pause in fighting and an influx of aid to Gaza, The Associated Press (AP) reported, citing Egyptian and Hamas officials.
The secretary of state showed similar optimism about reaching the deal on Wednesday and stated that he would use the remaining time in his post to facilitate an end to a conflict that has been ongoing for over 14 months.
“Look, I’m hopeful. You have to be. We’re going to use every minute of every day of every week that we have left to try to get this done,” Blinken said on Wednesday at the Council on Foreign Relations.
“But I don’t want to hazard a guess as to what the probability is,” he added.
On Thursday, Blinken, who recently came back from his 12th trip to the Middle East since the war broke out, said President Biden’s administration is cooperating with partners in the region to get Hamas to agree to a cease-fire agreement and reiterated the desire to bring back the hostages held in the enclave.
“So the real question is: is Hamas capable of making a decision and getting to yes? We’ve been fanning out with every possible partner on this to try to get the necessary pressure exerted on Hamas to say yes,” Blinken said on MSNBC.
“I was in Turkey meeting with President Erdogan. We have Bill Burns who’s headed – is already there in the region right now, Jake Sullivan, Brett McGurk,” he added. “Everyone is pushing on this. We want to get it over the finish line. We want to get the hostages home. We want to get a ceasefire so that people can finally have relief in Gaza.”
The war broke out when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 Israelis and taking some 250 hostage. Israel’s military responded with an offensive that has killed over 45,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants. The bombing has displaced around 90 percent of Gaza’s population, according to the UN.
