US Blinken Lands in Israel, Calls for ‘Steps to Calm Tensions’

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas (R) with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. (Photo: Mahmoud Abbas FB Page)

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken landed in Israel on Monday and urged both Israelis and Palestinians to take steps to ease a recent spike in tension, The New Arab reported.

“It is the responsibility of everyone to take steps to calm tensions rather than inflame them,” Blinken said.

The US Secretary of State arrived in Egypt first to begin his three-day visit to the Middle East.

On Monday, he is set to travel to Jerusalem to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and then he will head to Ramallah to hold talks with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

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The visit comes amid a surge in violence in Israel and the occupied territories.

A young Palestinian man on Friday killed seven people in an illegal settlement of occupied East Jerusalem.

The attack followed an Israeli military raid on Thursday where nine people were killed in the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, one of the deadliest such operations in years.

(The New Arab, PC, SOCIAL)

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