International community is racing against time to prevent military escalation in the Middle East

At an emergency meeting at the White House on Monday, U.S. diplomacy chief Antony Blinken delivered a message of containment.

He insisted: “We are engaging in intense diplomacy day and night with a very simple message: all involved must avoid escalation.”

The US Secretary of State called on Gaza Strip ArmisticePalestinian Islamist movement Hamas and Israel have been at war since October 7, when the Islamist group attacked Israeli territory.

In response, Israel vowed to destroy Hamas, which rules Gaza, and launched an offensive into Palestinian territory.

The conflict has heightened tensions in the region between Iran and its allies on the one hand, and Israel on the other.

These events were further exacerbated by the deaths of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on July 31 and Lebanon’s Hezbollah military leader Fuad Shukr in Beirut a few hours earlier.

Israel claimed responsibility for the attack that killed Shukr, accusing him of carrying out a bombing on July 27 in Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights annexed by the Jewish state that killed 12 Druze youths.

Israeli authorities have not commented on Haniyeh’s death, but Iran, Hamas and Lebanon’s Hezbollah have accused Israel and vowed to respond.

Diplomatic Exercises

Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian declared on Monday that Iran was not seeking to “prolong the war” but that Israel “will certainly be responded to for its crimes and arrogance.”

Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah, was due to speak on Tuesday but on Thursday declared that Israel had crossed a “red line” and a response to the bombing that killed Shouk was “inevitable.”

Since the start of the Gaza war, both the Lebanese Islamist movement and Yemen’s Houthi rebels, backed by Iran, have opened up fronts against Israel in “support” of the Palestinians.

Firefights are an almost daily occurrence along the Israeli-Lebanese border, and on Tuesday four Hezbollah fighters were killed in an Israeli bombing in southern Lebanon, a Lebanese security source told AFP.

The Israeli army announced on Monday that the head of the US Central Middle East Command (Centcom) arrived in Israel to assess the security situation. A Russian envoy also arrived in Tehran in turn.

A representative of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) said the group was meeting on Wednesday at the request of “Palestine and Iran” to reach a “unified Islamic position” in the region.

Meanwhile, the international community stepped up its diplomatic efforts. U.S. President Joe Biden spoke by phone on Monday with Jordan’s King Abdullah II.

Blinken hosted the prime minister of Qatar and the foreign minister of Egypt. He also spoke with the prime minister of Iraq about the possibility of an attack by Iran-backed militant groups in Iraq. Washington is a major ally of Israel.

French President Emmanuel Macron, UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyane and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in turn asked “all actors” in the Middle East to “take responsibility and exercise restraint.”

An impending attack?

Israel claims it is “preparing for all scenarios.”

But according to a European diplomat in Tel Aviv, the lack of directives from Israeli forces to civilians meant that, in theory, an attack would not be so imminent.

Despite this, many countries have asked their citizens to leave Lebanon and several airlines have suspended flights to Beirut.

The Israeli military continues its offensive against Hamas in Gaza. Israel, the United States and the European Union all consider the movement a “terrorist” organization.

Hamas’ October 7 attacks in southern Israel killed 1,197 people, mostly civilians, including more than 300 soldiers, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.

According to the Israeli army, Islamist militants have taken 251 hostages, 111 of whom remain in Gaza, but 39 of them are dead.

Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed 39,653 people so far, according to the territory’s health ministry, which did not detail the number of civilians and fighters killed.