Blinken visits Israel and Palestine as violence spikes

Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in Jerusalem on Monday to discuss the spike in violence between Israel and Palestine.

Blinken urged the two sides to ease tensions and appealed for de-escalation, but he did not offer specific proposals for how they can achieve peace, nor did he say what role the United States would play in offering help. The secretary of state will meet with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday.

“We’re urging all sides now to take urgent steps to restore calm, to de-escalate,” Blinken said after meeting Netanyahu, per the Associated Press. “We want to make sure that there’s an environment in which we can, I hope at some point, create conditions where we can start to restore a sense of security for Israelis and Palestinians alike, which of course is sorely lacking.”