By Simon Lewis
CAIRO (Reuters) -U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken hopes to advance efforts to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza and strengthen ties with Egypt when he visits Cairo on Wednesday, his spokesman said, amid concern about escalating Middle East tensions.
The top U.S. diplomat's visit comes as the region remains on high alert due to risk of Gaza war expanding, particularly after militant group Hezbollah promised to retaliate against Israel, accusing it of detonating pagers across Lebanon on Tuesday.
Israel has declined to respond to questions about the explosions. At least nine people died and nearly 3,000 others were wounded.
Speaking at a regular briefing, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said it was too early to say whether the incident in Lebanon would affect Gaza ceasefire talks but said the U.S. believed diplomacy was the way to reduce tensions.
Blinken met Egypt's President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi at Cairo's Al-Ittihadiya Palace on Wednesday morning, ahead of talks with Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty and other officials.
In Blinken's meetings with Egyptian officials, "squarely on the agenda is how we get a proposal that we think would secure agreement from both parties" to an Israel-Hamas ceasefire, Miller said.
U.S. officials have for weeks said a new proposal would be presented soon for a deal including the release of hostages taken from Israel by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023.
"There are some issues that we need to engage with the government of Egypt on as it relates to this ceasefire proposal that we are trying to bring to fruition," Miller said.
Blinken will head from Cairo to Paris on Thursday for a meeting with the foreign ministers of France, Italy and Britain to discuss the Middle East and Ukraine and other issues, a State Department official said. Blinken will also meet French President Emmanuel Macron, the official said.
Blinken will not visit Israel on this trip, the first time he has skipped a stop in Washington’s closest regional ally since Palestinian militant group Hamas sparked the war in Gaza nearly a year ago.
Miller said that was because Washington aimed to discuss bilateral issues with Egypt on this trip and the Gaza ceasefire proposal that U.S. and mediators have been working on was still not ready to present to Israel.
"So it would be premature to be presenting such a proposal, or doing any other diplomatic engagements," he added.
Egypt, alongside Qatar, has been a vital intermediary in U.S.-led diplomacy to end the war, shuttling proposals and counterproposals between Hamas and Israel. Washington has also leaned on Cairo in its efforts to increase the flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza’s 2.3 million war-battered residents.
Palestinian militants killed 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages in the attack on Israel last year, according to Israeli tallies. Israel's retaliatory assault on Gaza has killed more than 41,000 people and largely leveled the enclave, Gaza says.
In its decades-long alliance with Egypt, Washington has provided billions of dollars worth of military aid, despite accusations of widespread abuses under Sisi's government, including torture and enforced disappearances. Egypt's government denies the accusations.
A nod to Cairo's increased prominence came last week when Blinken waived human rights conditions in U.S. foreign military financing to Egypt and allowed the full amount of $1.3 billion for the first time since President Joe Biden took office in 2021.
Seth Binder, director of advocacy for the Washington-based Middle East Democracy Center, said after pledging to make human rights central to U.S.-Egypt ties, the Biden administration had "completely abandoned any pretense that human rights matter to the relationship."
(Reporting by Simon Lewis; Editing by Humeyra Pamuk and Cynthia Osterman)
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