US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, will travel to Egypt, Israel and the West Bank to discuss heightened tensions between Israelis and Palestinians as well as the war in Ukraine with regional leaders, the State Department said.
The top US diplomat’s visit was announced just hours after Israeli commandos killed nine Palestinians in the Occupied West Bank, according to Palestinian officials, stirring fear of further flare-ups after the largest single death toll in years of fighting,
It will be the US secretary of state’s first trip to Israel since the far-right government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took office last year. The visit comes after Israeli forces killed 10 Palestinians during a large-scale raid in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. US Secretary of State John Blinken will visit Israel, Egypt and the Middle East later this month to discuss US support for Israel’s security, particularly against threats from Iran. The trip comes after a deadly Israeli attack on an elderly Palestinian woman in the West Bank was described by Washington as a counterterrorism operation.
