US expects conflict to move to ‘lower intensity phase’

Gaza/Washington: The death toll of Palestinians from Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip since October 7 has reached 20,000, according to a statement issued by the Hamas-run government media office.
The statement said on Wednesday that the victims included more than 8,000 children and 6,200 women, while more than 52,000 people were injured and 6,700 others were missing, Xinhua news agency reported.
A total of 310 medical personnel, 35 civil defence personnel and 97 journalists were killed in the Israeli attacks, it added.
Meanwhile, two Palestinians were killed in clashes with Israeli soldiers in the West Bank cities of Hebron and Bethlehem, the Palestinian Health Ministry said on Wednesday.
It raised the death toll of Palestinians from Israeli gunfire in the occupied territory to 303 since this new round of Israeli-Palestinian conflict broke out on October 7, according to WAFA, the official Palestinian news agency.
Israel has been launching a large-scale offensive in Gaza to retaliate against a surprise Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7 when about 1,200 people were killed and more than 200 were taken hostage, according to the Israeli tallies.
The US expects to see the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas “move to a lower intensity phase,” the country’s top diplomat said.
“It’s clear that the conflict will move and needs to move to a lower intensity phase,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday during an end-of-year press conference at the State Department.
He added that it is Washington’s expectation and willingness that Israeli forces “shift to more targetted operations, with a smaller number of forces, that’s really focused in on dealing with the leadership of Hamas, the tunnel network, and a few other critical things”.
“It is vitally important how Israel conducts its operations,” he said.
“Again, focus on protecting civilians, minimising harm to them, maximising assistance getting to them.”
Blinken’s remarks came amid growing outrage around the world — and to some extent within the US — over the soaring Palestinian civilian deaths resulting from the intensification of aerial bombardments and ground operations by the Israel Defense Forces in the Gaza Strip following the October 7 attack by Hamas on Israeli civilians, Xinhua news agency reported.
Asked by a reporter whether the Joe Biden administration has any intent to rethink its diplomatic strategy in ways that will change the dynamics of a series of concurring conflicts still unfolding around the world, Blinken came to the administration’s defence, taking the conflict in Gaza as an example and complaining about having heard “virtually no one saying, demanding of Hamas — that it stop hiding behind civilians, that it lay down its arms, that it surrender”.
Earlier on Wednesday, Biden was asked by the press corps accompanying him on a trip in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to comment on a grim milestone of 20,000 Palestinian deaths in the conflict in Gaza that was expected to reach on Monday.
“It’s tragic,” the President said in a short answer, without elaborating.
Agencies

Press Trust of India