‘The ball is now in Hamas’s court’ for a ceasefire in Gaza, says US Secretary of State Antony Blinken

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If Hamas accepts the most recent ceasefire proposal, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Tuesday morning, “the deal is ready to be concluded and implemented.” 

At an Atlantic Council Front Page event, Blinken said that the United States, Qatar, and Egypt put forward a “final proposal” for a ceasefire in Gaza.  

“For the past several months, Hamas has played the spoiler,” Blinken argued. But now, after “weeks” of “intensive efforts,” an agreement is “closer than it’s ever been before,” he said. 

“It’s right on the brink,” the secretary of state said, when asked about reports that Hamas has accepted the agreement, adding that “the ball is now in Hamas’s court.” 

In his final speech as the United States’ top diplomat, Blinken—who said he believes “we will get a ceasefire”—outlined the Biden administration’s plan for postwar Gaza. Below are the elements of that plan and other highlights from his speech and conversation with Atlantic Council President and CEO Frederick Kempe. 

The vision 

  • As part of the plan, Blinken said that the Palestinian Authority (PA) should “invite international partners to help establish and run an interim administration with responsibility for key civil sectors in Gaza” such as water, health, and civil coordination with Israel. The interim administration, he added, “would include Palestinians from Gaza and representatives from the PA.” 
  • “The international community would provide funding, technical support, and oversight,” he added. In addition, under this plan, the international administrators would work closely with “a senior [United Nations] official,” who would “oversee the international stabilization and recovery effort.” 
  • He envisioned that the interim administration would “hand over complete responsibility to a fully reformed PA administration as soon as it’s feasible.” 
  • Blinken also called for an “interim security mission”—made up of Palestinian personnel and security forces from partner countries—to protect humanitarian and reconstruction efforts, and also to secure the border, in an effort to prevent Hamas from rebuilding its military capacity. “We would stand up a new initiative to train, to equip, [and] to vet a PA-led security force for Gaza to focus on law and order and gradually take over for the interim security mission,” he explained. 
  • “Some of our partners have already expressed their willingness to contribute troops and police for such a mission—but if, and only if, it is agreed that Gaza and the West Bank are reunified under a reformed PA as part of a pathway to an independent Palestinian state,” he said. 

What it will take 

  • Making the Biden administration’s vision a reality, Blinken said, will “require all parties to summon the political will to make hard decisions, hard compromises,” he said. 
  • For example, he said, “key regional and international actors will need to fully commit to supporting Palestinian-led governance and preventing Hamas’s return.”  
  • In addition, “The PA will need to carry out swift, far-reaching reform to build more transparent and accountable governance,” Blinken said, adding that “Israel will have to accept reuniting Gaza and the West Bank under the leadership of a reformed PA.” 
  • The secretary of state also argued that the path forward must be time-bound—to avoid an “endless process”—and conditions-based. 
  • With President-elect Donald Trump soon to enter the White House, Blinken said that his team would “hand off that plan” to the incoming administration “to carry forward.” 
  • “We stand here today with a historic window of opportunity still open,” he said. “While seizing it cannot bring back the innocent Israeli and Palestinian lives lost, it will prevent more lives from being taken. It will break the cycle of violence and bloodshed. We must not squander this chance.” 

Read Blinken’s full keynote address

New Atlanticist

Jan 14, 2025

The Biden administration’s vision for postwar Gaza

By Antony J. Blinken

At an Atlantic Council Front Page event, Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivered remarks on the Biden administration’s Middle East policy and the prospects for peace in the region.

Conflict Crisis Management

Biden’s Middle East legacy 

  • Some have questioned whether the Biden administration’s policies toward the Middle East “put too much pressure on Israel, on Hamas, on Iran, or not enough,” Blinken acknowledged. “I wish I could stand here today and tell you with certainty that we got every decision right. I cannot.” 
  • When it comes to Biden’s legacy in the Middle East, “it’s not just what we achieved but also what we prevented,” Blinken said. He argued that US diplomatic and military action—including its efforts, in concert with other allies and partners, to defend Israel from Iranian missile attacks—has helped prevent a regional war. 

What comes next 

  • Blinken noted that one of the major issues Trump will face upon taking office next week is the prospect of Iran developing a nuclear weapon, and when Trump pulled out of the nuclear deal known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in his first term, he raised the prospect of striking a better deal. “OK, let’s see,” Blinken said. “Maybe there’s an opportunity to do just that. If not, I know that there’s a shared determination across administrations to ensure that Iran never gets a nuclear weapon, one way or another.”  
  • Blinken said that the Biden administration had achieved “significant progress” on strengthening the US-Saudi Arabia relationship and moving toward Israel-Saudi Arabia normalization. “Much of the heavy lifting for normalization is complete—including negotiations on complex US-Saudi elements of an agreement,” he said.  
  • He later added that, because it is “ready to go,” normalization “could move forward tomorrow. But it requires two things. It requires an end of the conflict in Gaza, and it requires a credible pathway to a Palestinian state.” 
  • “Israelis will have to decide if actually realizing a foundational dream—being integrated into the region, being treated like a normal country,” Blinken said, “whether that is worth also the decisions necessary to finally resolve their relationship with the Palestinians, as well as ending the conflict in Gaza.”

Katherine Walla is the associate director of editorial at the Atlantic Council. 

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Further reading

Image: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken speaks at the Atlantic Council on January 14, 2025.