U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel on Friday for talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of a U.N. Security Council vote on a U.S. draft resolution citing the need for an “immediate” ceasefire to provide more assistance.

Washington announced it would submit a draft on the need for an “immediate ceasefire as part of the hostage agreement” to a vote on Friday, after repeatedly using its veto to block previous ceasefire resolutions.

Blinken began talks with Netanyahu shortly after arriving in Tel Aviv following talks in Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Washington and other allies have stepped up pressure on Israel’s leaders amid Israel’s war against Hamas militants in Gaza.

Israel said on Friday it would continue military operations in and around Shifa hospital for a fifth day, according to the United Nations. The hospital is the largest medical facility in the besieged area, but most are no longer functioning.

The United States, which has provided billions of dollars in military aid to Israel, has become increasingly outspoken about the impact of the nearly six months of war on civilians in Gaza.

Israel has vowed to send troops into Rafah, the southern tip of Gaza, to confront Hamas militants there.

‘A mistake’

With most of Gaza’s population taking refuge in the border area with Egypt, the prospect has caused widespread alarm among the international community.

Blinken said during the visit that launching a ground attack on Rafah would be “a mistake.”

“The civilians gathered in Rafah have nowhere to escape,” he said in Cairo.

“There are better ways to deal with the ongoing threat posed by Hamas.”

On Thursday, leaders of the 27-nation European Union also urged opposition to Rafah’s ground operation, saying it would “further worsen the already catastrophic humanitarian situation.”

David Bania, the head of Israel’s Mossad spy agency, will meet with CIA Director William Burns, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and the Egyptian Intelligence Service in Doha, Qatar’s capital. Director Abbas Kamel, for further truce negotiations.

The effort hinges on the release of hostages held by Hamas militants in exchange for Palestinian prisoners detained by Israel and more aid to Gaza, where 2.4 million people face the looming threat of famine.

Blinken said in Cairo on Thursday that “divisions are narrowing” and that Washington is “continuing to push for a deal in Doha.”

“Getting there will be difficult, but I believe it’s still possible,” Blinken said, making his sixth trip to the region since the war broke out after Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7.

A Hamas official said Israel’s reaction to the group’s latest proposal had been “largely negative.”

Hamas attacks in October killed about 1,160 people in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli figures.

The militants also held about 250 hostages, of whom Israel believes that about 130 remain in Gaza, and 33 of them are suspected to be dead.

“Immediate and continuing ceasefire”

Israel, vowing to destroy Hamas, carried out relentless bombings alongside a ground invasion that killed at least 31,988 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, the health ministry in Hamas-controlled areas said.

The latest version of the US Security Council draft resolution, seen by AFP, states that an “immediate and sustained ceasefire is needed to protect civilians on all sides, allow the delivery of basic humanitarian assistance, and alleviate humanitarian suffering.”

The document added that it supports “diplomatic efforts to secure a ceasefire and the release of all remaining hostages.”

Hours before the Security Council meeting, Britain and Australia issued a statement stressing the “urgent need for an immediate end to the fighting in Gaza to allow aid to flow and hostages to be released.”

EU leaders also called for an “immediate suspension of humanitarian operations” at a meeting in Brussels on Thursday.

After blocking an Algerian draft resolution in February calling for an “immediate humanitarian ceasefire” in Gaza, U.S. officials have been negotiating an alternative text focused on supporting diplomatic efforts on the ground for a six-week truce in exchange for the release of hostages.

However, the US draft did not explicitly use the word “call” and simply stated that a ceasefire is imperative.

Russia said the resolution was too weak, while China said it supported “meaningful action” by the Security Council but did not say whether it would support the resolution.

The Israeli military said on Friday it had killed more than 150 militants in the “area” of Gaza City’s Al-Shifa hospital since operations began on Monday.

“pressure”

The statement added that hundreds of suspects had been arrested and weapons found.

In a video released on Wednesday, an Army spokesman said no civilians or medical personnel were injured in the operation, which Army Chief of Staff Gen. Hertz Halevi said was “very important to put pressure on negotiations.”

AFP footage showed people fleeing south along the Gaza coast to escape attacks on hospitals.

The U.N. humanitarian agency OCHA cited the Palestinian Civil Defense Organization as saying that the army “reportedly refused to allow civil defense personnel to reach and rescue hundreds of injured people surrounding the hospital.”

A 60-year-old patient who gave his name only as Younis said he was forced out naked and blindfolded for questioning before being released.

Soldiers “beaten all the young people and arrested them,” he told AFP.

The Israeli military said it was working to “identify anomalies that differ from what the troops expected.”

Children in Gaza are “starving to death”, a U.N. panel of independent experts said on Thursday, after U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk accused Israel of blocking aid and doing so in a way that “may amount to using starvation as a solution to the problem.” war”.

Israel rejected his claims.

Separately, Israeli Colonel Moshe Tetro of COGAT, the Israeli defense agency responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, refuted the statement that there is “no food, no fuel, and famine” in Gaza, calling it a “pure lie.”

He spoke at Gate 96, a new crossing point for aid trucks entering northern Gaza from Israel.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)