U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is urging Israel and the Palestinians to exercise restraint and ease tensions amid a spike in violence that has put the region on edge
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, left, and Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry hold a press conference in Cairo, Egypt, Monday Jan. 30, 2023. CAIRO — — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Israel and the Palestinians on Monday to exercise restraint and ease tensions amid a spike in violence that has put the region on edge.
He repeated U.S. condemnations of militant attacks against Israelis and noted that “we deplore overall the loss of innocent civilian life." The violence comes after months of Israeli arrest raids in the West Bank, which were launched after a wave of Palestinians attacks against Israelis in the spring of 2022 that killed 19 people.
The visit, which was planned before the flare-up, was already expected to be fraught with tension over differences between the Biden administration and Netanyahu’s government, which is made up of settlement supporters. Israel also arrested 42 Palestinians, some relatives of the Jerusalem attacker, in its investigation into the attack. And the firebrand National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said he has ordered authorities to demolish illegally built Palestinian homes in east Jerusalem in response to the attack.
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