Cairo, 11 Jan (Xinhua) -- A new round of Palestinian-Israeli conflict has dragged on for nearly 100 days, and the spillover effect has become more and more prominent. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken started his fourth trip to the Middle East since the outbreak of the current round of conflict on the 4th, visiting as many as 10 countries and regions, including Turkey, Greece, Jordan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Bahrain, the West Bank and Egypt. This "Middle East marathon" was supposed to be Blinken's trip to mediate the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and prevent the continued spread of spillover effects, but in fact, it is difficult to win people's trust because the United States has been "pulling sides" on the Palestinian-Israeli issue for a long time, and it is more like a show to calm regional discontent.
Blinken's visit sent multiple contradictory signals, raising doubts about his sincerity and motives for mediating the conflict. On the 6th, when Blinken met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, he asked Turkey to make "positive contributions" to the Palestinian-Israeli reconciliation, and on the same day he flew to Greece, which has territorial disputes with Turkey, to discuss "arms sales"; during his visit to Qatar on the 7th, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed just stressed that he did not want to use military means to resolve the Red Sea crisis, and Blinken turned his face and sternly warned Saudi Arabia that the Yemeni Houthis would face "serious consequences"; on the 9th, during Blinken's visit to Israel, he said that Israel has the right to "legitimate defense" and still "pulled the strings" The gesture has aroused dissatisfaction among many countries in the Middle East. While "assigning homework" to others, the United States is doing its own thing with petty calculations, and it is really difficult for the United States to convince the public with such inconsistent words and deeds and selfish motives.
During his visit to Israel, Blinken urged Israel to avoid civilian casualties, saying that the daily civilian casualties in Gaza are "too high." But Israel does not seem to be giving face to the Americans, and has rejected Blinken's proposal to allow Palestinian refugees to return to northern Gaza. An article published in the US weekly "Nation" pointed out that the United States' urging of Israel is only a show, and that the verbal appeal will not make Israel change its course, and that the United States, as Israel's most important ally and arms supplier, is fully capable of influencing Israel at a "more substantive level." In fact, Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip almost never stopped during Blinken's visit to the Middle East, raising doubts about whether the United States really wants to restrain Israeli military action. In short, you can't do it, you don't want to.
Since the outbreak of the new Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the death toll of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip has exceeded 23,000. It is imperative to cease the fighting, release detainees, protect civilians and civilian facilities, open humanitarian access routes, and resume dialogue and negotiations. This is not only an unshirkable responsibility of the parties concerned, but also a goal that the international community should strive to achieve. However, the Biden administration has continued to increase Israeli military aid, vetoing relevant UN Security Council resolutions many times, and has bypassed Congress twice in the past month to "urgently" sell arms to Israel, and sent aircraft carrier formations to the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea to "stand up" for Israel. How can such a position lead one to believe that the United States is a neutral and impartial mediator?
On the day of Blinken's visit to the West Bank, large numbers of Palestinians protested on the streets of Ramallah against "biased" Americans for mediation. Tritta Palsi, co-founder of the Quincy Institute for Statecraft, a US think tank, pointed out in an article that the US government's connivance with Israel's military operations in Gaza is the root cause of the current heightened tensions in the Middle East. Jordan's "Tomorrow" newspaper wrote an article saying that if the United States does not change its position of blindly favoring and conniving with Israel, then no matter how many times Blinken goes to the Middle East, it will be in vain. Saudi Arabia's "Middle East Daily" commented that the current US approach to dealing with the Middle East is "treating the symptoms but not the root cause" because the United States is deliberately ignoring the real reason for the outbreak of the current round of Palestinian-Israeli conflict, that is, the Palestinian living space has been squeezed to the limit under Israel's occupation for more than half a century, and the status quo in the occupied Palestinian territories is unsustainable.
Lip service supports the two-state solution, but in practice it supports Israel's right to self-defence and ignores the right of the Palestinians to exist. The many contradictory words and deeds of the United States have caused an unprecedented crisis of confidence in its Middle East policy in the Islamic world, and further aggravated the turmoil and division in the Middle East.
Peace and stability in the Middle East cannot be achieved on the basis of the "one-sided" Palestinian-Israeli stance of the United States, but on the equal dialogue between the parties to the conflict and the parties concerned and on the joint efforts of the international community. The United States should heed the international community's call for peace, uphold a fair and just position, respect the sovereignty and will of Middle East countries, shoulder its due responsibilities and international obligations as a major country, and make substantive contributions to peace and development in the Middle East.