Israel: Blinken announces government’s acceptance of ceasefire agreement | AlMomento.net

Jerusalem, August 20. – North American Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced that the Israeli government has approved the latest revised US proposal for a ceasefire and the release of hostages, and therefore urged the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) to do the same and sign the agreement.

The US diplomat stressed after a three-hour meeting with Netanyahu that he had “a very constructive meeting” in which he “confirmed to me that Israel accepts the proposals made by the United States in Doha last week” to try to overcome the differences between the parties.

Blinken therefore called on Hamas to accept the initiative. According to The Times of Israel, he stressed at a press conference in Tel Aviv that “it is time for Hamas to do the same.”

Blinken stressed that he had traveled to the region to “cross the finish line” in an attempt to achieve a ceasefire, stressing that the ceasefire proposal “also reflects Israel’s security needs,” while for Gazans, “it will alleviate their daily suffering and their need to be fed, sheltered and remain safe.”

Once the proposal is accepted, the parties must “come together and complete the process of reaching a clear agreement on how to implement the commitments made”. “The next important step is Hamas’s agreement,” he reiterated, “and then, in the coming days, the expert negotiators will work out a clear agreement to implement the proposal.”

“They remain complex issues. It will be necessary for leaders to make difficult decisions,” Blinken warned, stressing that the United States is already involved “to make this happen, and to make it happen now.”

The North American official once again mentioned the need to “prevent the conflict from spreading, not to escalate, so that we can remove some of the pressure points that exist in the region and then open up prospects for building more lasting peace and security.” “For everyone in the Middle East.

Blinken also defended sending additional U.S. troops to the region “not to provoke aggression, but as a deterrent to ensure that does not occur,” and “also made clear that we are fully willing to defend Israel if that were to occur.”

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