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U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Monday arrived in Cairo to push for efforts to bring about a ceasefire in neighbour Gaza. He will meet with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in Cairo for talks with top Egyptian officials to end the conflict that has pervaded in Gaza for the past two weeks.
Kerry is set to push for an “immediate” ceasefire in Gaza, like US President Barack Obama had said earlier in the day. Obama had also said that even if Israel had the right to “defend itself”, Washington has “serious concerns about the rising number of Palestinian civilian deaths and the loss of Israeli lives”.
“That is why it now has to be our focus and the focus of the international community to bring about a ceasefire that ends the fighting and that can stop the deaths of innocent civilians, both in Gaza and in Israel”, he said.
The conflict has dramatically escalated in the past few days, with Israeli ground troops forcing into Gaza, where the death toll now has hit 572.
Obama said that Israel had “already done significant damage to Hamas’ terrorist infrastructure in Gaza”.
Regarding efforts to mediate any kind of a peace deal, Obama said that “The work will not be easy”.
“Obviously, there are enormous passions involved in this, and some very difficult strategic issues involved.
Nevertheless, I’ve asked John to do everything he can to help facilitate a cessation to hostilities. We don’t want to see any more civilians getting killed”, he added.
Later in the day, the White House said that Israel should do more to so that civilians are not caught up in the crossfire between Hamas and Israeli forces in Gaza.
“We would like the Israelis to take even greater steps to ensure the protection of civilians” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.