The Washington PostDemocracy Dies in Darkness
Displaced Palestinians inspect damage to their tents Tuesday after an Israeli bombardment at a refugee camp in Rafah, southern Gaza. (Said Khatib/AFP/Getty Images)

Middle East conflict live updates Blinken to visit Israel amid tensions over plan to invade Rafah

clock icon
2 min

Secretary of State Antony Blinken is set to make a quick stop in Israel on Friday, according to the State Department, as the Biden administration pushes Israeli leaders to take a pinpoint approach to battling Hamas in the packed city of Rafah in southern Gaza to avoid what it warns could be humanitarian catastrophe. Tensions are rising between the United States and Israel over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plans to invade Rafah, which is crowded with nearly 1.5 million displaced Palestinians. The Israeli military said Wednesday that it was continuing its raid on al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, where people said they were trapped in dire conditions.

Key updates
Skip to end of carousel
Blinken is traveling to the Middle East on Wednesday to push again for a cease-fire deal and a postwar plan for Gaza. An “attack on Rafah would hamper any efforts to get a deal,” Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed Al Ansari said earlier.
Netanyahu said he made clear to President Biden that there was “no way” to eliminate Hamas without a ground incursion in Rafah. The Biden administration, which has said storming the city would be a mistake, is set to host Israeli officials to discuss U.S. concerns, probably early next week.
Preparations to enter Rafah would “take some time,” Netanyahu said Wednesday in a recorded video address.
Osama Hamdan, a senior Hamas official, said Israel responded with a “generally negative response” to the group’s latest cease-fire proposal. Speaking at a televised news conference Wednesday, Hamdan said the Israeli side walked back previous approvals offered to mediators “to delve deeper into the policy of procrastination in order to hamper negotiations, and perhaps lead them to a dead end.”
At least 31,819 people have been killed and 73,934 injured in Gaza since the war began, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Israel estimates that about 1,200 people were killed in Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack and says 251 soldiers have been killed since the start of its military operation in Gaza.
End of carousel
Skip to end of carousel
Blinken is traveling to the Middle East on Wednesday to push again for a cease-fire deal and a postwar plan for Gaza. An “attack on Rafah would hamper any efforts to get a deal,” Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed Al Ansari said earlier.
Netanyahu said he made clear to President Biden that there was “no way” to eliminate Hamas without a ground incursion in Rafah. The Biden administration, which has said storming the city would be a mistake, is set to host Israeli officials to discuss U.S. concerns, probably early next week.
Preparations to enter Rafah would “take some time,” Netanyahu said Wednesday in a recorded video address.
Osama Hamdan, a senior Hamas official, said Israel responded with a “generally negative response” to the group’s latest cease-fire proposal. Speaking at a televised news conference Wednesday, Hamdan said the Israeli side walked back previous approvals offered to mediators “to delve deeper into the policy of procrastination in order to hamper negotiations, and perhaps lead them to a dead end.”
At least 31,819 people have been killed and 73,934 injured in Gaza since the war began, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Israel estimates that about 1,200 people were killed in Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack and says 251 soldiers have been killed since the start of its military operation in Gaza.
End of carousel

Live coverage contributors 13

Live updates continue below

Israel-Gaza war

Israel-Gaza war: Israel’s military said it was carrying out a “precise operation” at Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital, citing Israeli intelligence that the complex was being used by senior Hamas militants. The Gaza Health Ministry said communications were cut and reported people killed or injured. Meanwhile, at least half the population in Gaza is facing what the United Nations has repeatedly described as “famine-like conditions.”

Middle East conflict: Tensions in the region continue to rise. As Israeli troops aim to take control of the Gaza-Egypt border crossing, officials in Cairo warn that the move would undermine the 1979 peace treaty. Meanwhile, there’s a diplomatic scramble to avert full-scale war between Israel and Lebanon.

U.S. involvement: U.S. airstrikes in Iraq and Syria killed dozens of Iranian-linked militants, according to Iraqi officials. The strikes were the first round of retaliatory action by the Biden administration for an attack in Jordan that killed three U.S. service members.