Turkey to play ‘productive’ role in postwar Gaza: Blinken

Photo:Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the Vahdettin private residence of the presidency in Istanbul on January 6, 2024.  © Handout, AFP

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held talks in Istanbul on Saturday with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on how to de-escalate regional tensions, saying later that Turkey was committed to playing a “productive” role in postwar Gaza. Blinken said a “big part” of his whirlwind, eight-day trip will be looking at how the international community can “make sure that this conflict doesn’t spread”.

Highlights:

• Following talks on Saturday with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Turkey was committed to playing “a positive, productive” role in postwar Gaza and would use its influence to prevent the Israel-Hamas war from becoming a larger regional conflict. 
• Blinken said a “big part of the conversations” during his whirlwind, eight-day trip focused on Gaza will be looking at how nations can use their respective influence “to make sure that this conflict doesn’t spread“. His trip includes stops in Istanbul, Crete, Amman, Doha, Abu Dhabi, Tel Aviv, the West Bank, Cairo and Al-‘Ula in Saudi Arabia.
• The Israeli army said it had completed dismantling Hamas’s “military framework” in northern Gaza, with an Israeli military spokesman adding that some 8,000 militants have been killed in the fighting.
• Lebanon’s Hezbollah fired more than 60 rockets at an Israeli base, with the group describing the barrage as an “initial response” to the killing of Hamas deputy chief Saleh al-Arouri in Beirut last week.
• Israeli officials say 1,139( and not 1200 as originally claimed ) were killed in the Hamas-led October 7 attacks in southern Israel, among them 695 Israeli civilians including 36 children. At least 22,722 people have been killed and 58,166 wounded in Israel’s ensuing assault on the Gaza Strip, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run enclave.
• US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Crete late Saturday as part of a diplomatic tour focused on the war in Gaza.
• US vessel shoots down Houthi drone over the Red Sea
• A US vessel shot down a drone “in self-defense” over the Red Sea that was launched from Houthi territory in Yemen, US Central Command said on Saturday.
• France’s Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna said on Saturday that she urged her Iranian counterpart to bring an end to Tehran’s “destabilizing” activities and those of its proxies.
• The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) said in a social media post on Saturday that almost 90% of Gaza’s population has been displaced in three months of war following the October 7 Hamas attacks in Israel.

France24