US expects India & Canada to resolve their dispute as friends

NEW DELHI, Nov 10 (The CONNECT) – In the first ever but belated candid admission on the ongoing Israeli bombings of Gaza, the United States has said far too many Palestinians have been killed and far too many have suffered these past weeks. 

Addressing the media on the last day of  his nine-day trip of intensive diplomacy throughout the Middle East and now here in the Indo-Pacific, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken today said much more needs to be done to protect civilians and to make sure that humanitarian assistance reaches them. 

“Far too many Palestinians have been killed; far too many have suffered these past weeks,” he said and remarked:  “And we want to do everything possible to prevent harm to them and to maximize the assistance that gets to them”.

Blinken said the US will  continue to discuss with Israel concrete steps that can be taken to advance these objectives and continue to focus relentlessly on getting our hostages home.  Expanding humanitarian assistance that gets into Gaza and reaches people in effective ways, is also a priority item, he said.

He stressed that the foundation for durable and lasting peace in the region has to has to include two states for two peoples.

“We made some progress first in trying to establish some basic principles that can guide us in that effort, including among them: no forcible displacement of Palestinians from Gaza; no use of Gaza as a platform for launching terrorism or other attacks against Israel; no diminution in the territory of Gaza; and a commitment to Palestinian-led governance for Gaza and for the West Bank, and in a unified way.  These and some other ideas that we’ve put forward and that others share, I think, can start to be the basis for what we need to do,” he explained.

Talk it over, Jai- Blinken seems to suggest to his Indian counterpart on the impasse with Canada.

Blinken said he was also very clear that much more needs to be done in terms of both protecting civilians and getting humanitarian assistance to them.  “We just need to see more of it, and we need to maximize every effort to prevent Palestinian deaths and to advance the humanitarian assistance that’s getting to them,” he pointed out.

The Biben administration, he said, has long been committed to two states.  “When we came to office, the conditions certainly didn’t look like they were ripe to advance that in the moment.  We first needed to try to make sure that there was as much calm as possible, and then to try to build from there,” he said. 

“And that’s what we’ve been working on very resolutely for the last two and a half years, including pushing back on the expansion of settlements, on illegal outposts, on demolitions of homes, on evictions of Palestinians, on the status quo for the holy sites, on violence being perpetrated by extremists in the West Bank – by the way, something else that we’ve been very focused on – these past week – this past week or so,” he said.

About his Delhi trip, Blinken said the US appreciates the fact that India strongly condemned the attacks of October 7th. 

Asked about his message to his Indian counterpart on the current impasse with Canada, Blinken said the US wanted both the countries resolving any differences or disputes that they have as a friend of both.  He stressed that it is very important that India work with Canada on its investigation, and that they find a way to resolve this difference in a cooperative way.  “But that really does go with Canada moving its investigation forward and India working with Canada on it,” he said. 

“And that’s something that I’ve discussed with our Indian counterparts, including today,” Blinken said.