Jordan to hold tripartite talks on the Gaza conflict today

Jordan’s King Abdullah will hold a summit with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday to discuss the “serious developments” in the Gaza Strip, the Jordanian state news agency reported on Tuesday.

Separately, Sean Casey, World Health Organisation (WHO) Emergency Medical Teams coordinator in Gaza, said the health system was fast collapsing, and Israel was denying access to more and more of Gaza for relief trucks.

“Every day we line up our convoys, we wait for clearance, and we don’t get it - and then we come back and we do it again the next day.”

Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday urged Israeli leaders to avoid harming civilians in the war in Gaza and to seek a path towards the creation of Palestinian state as a way to resolve the long-running wider conflict.

Blinken met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Tel Aviv’s Kirya military base on Tuesday and then with his war cabinet.

He stressed “the importance of avoiding further civilian harm and protecting civilian infrastructure in Gaza,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.

 
Jordan's King Abdullah II receives US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Amman. File/AFP

Blinken also repeated the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s right to prevent a repeat of the Oct.7 attacks by Hamas in southern Israel which killed 1,200 people and triggered the war in Gaza.

The Israeli air and ground assault has now killed more than 23,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry, and obliterated large areas of the densely populated enclave.

As well as trying to tamp down regional tensions, Blinken has been discussing plans for the future governance of Gaza once the war is over.

In the meetings with Netanyahu, Blinken “reiterated the need to ensure lasting, sustainable peace for Israel and the region, including by the realisation of a Palestinian state,” Miller said.

Before arriving in Israel, Blinken held talks in Jordan, Qatar, the UAE and Saudi Arabia, which have focused on seeking a longer-term approach to the Israel-Palestinian conflict to help end the Gaza war.

After his meetings with Washington’s Arab allies, he said they wanted closer relations with Israel but only if that included a “practical pathway” to a Palestinian state.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits a World Food Program regional warehouse in Amman, Jordan. AP

The health ministry in Gaza said 126 Palestinians had been killed and 241 wounded in the previous 24 hours.

Hizbollah said it launched a drone strike at the Israeli army’s northern headquarters Tuesday in retaliation for recent strikes in Lebanon that killed top Hamas and Hizbollah officials.

Israel’s military acknowledged that one of its army bases in northern Israel was targeted but said there were no injuries or damage. It did not specify where the base was located.

Also Tuesday, an Israeli drone strike in Lebanon killed three Hizbollah members, officials said.

Hizbollah said it struck at the Israeli army’s northern command headquarters in Safed with several drones.

The International Criminal Court confirmed Tuesday that it is investigating potential crimes against journalists since the outbreak of war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, where dozens of reporters have been killed.

Media advocacy group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in November that it had filed a complaint with the Hague-based ICC alleging war crimes over the deaths of journalists trying to cover the conflict.

“The office of prosecutor Karim Khan has assured the organisation that crimes against journalists are included in its investigation into Palestine,” the NGO announced on Monday.

Trucks carrying containers and equipment for a Jordanian field hospital arrive through Rafah border. File/Reuters

For his first service of 2024, Palestinian pastor Munther Isaac read a biblical passage in which God chooses the weakest “to shame the powerful,” a key theme to him as the Gaza war rages on.

Since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on Oct.7, Isaac has tirelessly preached for a ceasefire in Gaza and reproached Western churches for their “silence.”

Isaac, 45, said the passage, from Saint Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, is more relevant than ever given the current situation in the Palestinian territory.

“I believe God is using the children of Gaza to challenge the hypocrisy of the Western world, the racism, the prejudice of the Western world towards Palestinians and towards the children of Gaza,” he told reporters.

Isaac is a pastor at the Evangelical Lutheran Christmas Church in Bethlehem in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the city revered by Christians as the birthplace of Jesus Christ.

Agencies