联合国安理会外交官和穆斯林外交部长周日召开紧急会议，要求停止平民流血事件。以色列战机实施了近一周以来最致命的一次袭击，包括哈马斯无情的火箭弹袭击和以色列空袭。
总统乔·拜登尽管一些民主党人呼吁拜登政府更多地参与进来，但没有迹象表明以色列会加大压力，同意立即停火。他的驻联合国大使琳达·托马斯·格林菲尔德在安全理事会的一次高级别紧急会议上说，美国正在“通过外交渠道不懈努力”停止战斗。
但是，随着以色列和加沙地带的战斗飙升至2014年以来的最严重水平，国际社会的抗议声也越来越大，拜登政府决心将美国的外交政策重点从中东和阿富汗转移开来，拒绝向以色列提出任何公开要求，要求其同意停火或进一步深化美国的外交参与。其他国家呼吁加沙激进的哈马斯统治者和以色列停止开火，但没有任何进展的迹象。
托马斯·格林菲尔德警告说，武装冲突的重新爆发只会使长达数十年的以巴冲突更难以通过谈判达成两国解决方案。然而，以色列最亲密的盟友美国迄今为止阻止了中国、挪威和突尼斯几天来为使安理会发表声明，包括呼吁停止敌对行动所做的努力。
在以色列，美国国务卿安东尼·布林肯(Antony Blinken)派出的试图缓和危机的副助理哈迪·阿姆尔(Hady Amr)会见了以色列国防部长本尼·甘茨(Benny Gantz)，甘茨感谢美国的支持。
布林肯本人周日前往北欧国家进行了一次无关的旅行，没有宣布在中东停留以应对危机的计划。他从飞机上打电话给埃及和其他努力促成停火的国家，告诉埃及各方“应该缓和紧张局势，停止暴力。”
众议院情报委员会民主党主席亚当·希夫(Adam Schiff)周日与佛蒙特州独立派参议员伯尼·桑德斯一道，呼吁拜登向双方施加压力，结束目前的战斗，恢复谈判，以解决以色列与巴勒斯坦人的冲突和热点。
“我认为政府需要向以色列和巴勒斯坦权力机构施加更大的压力，以停止暴力，实现停火，结束这些敌对行动，并回到试图解决这一长期冲突的进程中，”加州民主党人希夫在接受哥伦比亚广播公司《面对国家》采访时表示。
拜登政府官员敦促保持冷静，但没有公开表示要敦促以色列立即配合埃及和其他国家的停火努力。托马斯·格林菲尔德说，美国外交官正在与以色列、埃及和卡塔尔以及联合国进行接触
医务人员说，以色列周日对加沙城的空袭夷平了三栋建筑，造成至少42人死亡，使哈马斯和以色列开始空袭和炮击以来的死亡人数达到加沙至少188人，以色列8人。死者中包括加沙的大约55名儿童和以色列的一名5岁男孩。
以色列总理本雅明·内塔尼亚胡周日在一次电视讲话中告诉以色列人，以色列“希望对加沙地带的激进哈马斯统治者征收沉重的代价”。内塔尼亚胡说，这将“需要时间”，这表明战争将暂时继续。
穆斯林国家的代表开会要求以色列停止在拥挤的加沙地带杀害巴勒斯坦平民的袭击。沙特外交部长费萨尔·本·法尔汉呼吁“国际社会采取紧急行动，立即停止军事行动。”
在由57个国家组成的伊斯兰合作组织的会议上，土耳其和其他一些国家还批评了美国支持的一项推动措施，根据这项措施，阿拉伯联合酋长国、巴林和其他伊斯兰国家与以色列签署了双边协议，以实现两国关系正常化，从而打破了国际社会为促成以色列和巴勒斯坦长期和平所做的努力的崩溃。
伊朗外交部长穆罕默德·贾瓦德·扎里夫说:“今天对巴勒斯坦儿童的屠杀是在所谓的正常化之后发生的。”。王国呼吁国际社会采取紧急行动，立即停止军事行动，
在安理会的虚拟会议上，联合国秘书长安东尼奥·古特雷斯说，联合国正在积极争取各方立即停火。
古特雷斯说，回到以色列和哈马斯之间第四次这样的战争中巴勒斯坦激进分子发射火箭和以色列空袭的场景，“只会使死亡、破坏和绝望的循环永久化，并将共存与和平的希望推向更远的地平线”。
八名外交部长在安理会会议上发言，反映了冲突的严重性，几乎所有人都敦促结束战斗。
拜登的前任唐纳德·特朗普(Donald Trump)坚定地支持以色列，将内塔尼亚胡视为特朗普对抗伊朗的盟友。特朗普几乎没有时间考虑美国历届政府推动以色列和巴勒斯坦人之间和平协议的努力，而是鼓励和奖励与以色列签署两国正常化协议的阿拉伯国家。
相反，拜登称中东和中亚冲突分散了美国外交政策的重点，包括与中国的竞争。
他试图平息一些冲突，使美国摆脱其他冲突，包括结束美国对沙特领导的也门战争的军事支持，计划从阿富汗撤军，以及试图恢复与伊朗的核协议。
拜登官员没有将更深入的以巴和平努力列为他们的首要议程。
奥巴马政府负责中东事务的前副助理国务卿塔玛拉·科夫曼·威特斯说，这个问题不会消失。
她说，目前的战斗“揭示了以色列人和巴勒斯坦人之间的‘现状’有多不稳定，以及迫切需要一条新的政治道路来推动这场冲突走向谈判解决”。
Calls mount for Gaza-Israel cease-fire, greater US efforts
U.N. Security Council diplomats and Muslim foreign ministers convened emergency meetings Sunday to demand a stop to civilian bloodshed as Israeli warplanes carried out the deadliest single attacks in nearly a week of unrelenting Hamas rocket barrages and Israeli airstrikes.
PresidentJoe Bidengave no signs of stepping up any pressure on Israel to agree to an immediate cease-fire despite calls from some Democrats for the Biden administration to get more involved. His ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, told an emergency high-level meeting of the Security Council that the United States was “working tirelessly through diplomatic channels" to stop the fighting.
But as fighting in Israel and Gaza surged to its worst levels since 2014 and the international outcry grew, the Biden administration — determined to wrench U.S. foreign policy focus away from the Middle East and Afghanistan — has declined to ratchet up any public demands on Israel to agree to a cease-fire or further deepen U.S. diplomatic involvement. Appeals by other countries for Gaza's militant Hamas rulers and Israel to stop their fire showed no sign of progress.
Thomas-Greenfield warned that the return to armed conflict would only put a negotiated two-state solution to the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict even further out of reach. However, the United States, Israel's closest ally, has so far blocked days of efforts by China, Norway and Tunisia to get the Security Council to issue a statement, including a call for the cessation of hostilities.
In Israel, Hady Amr, a deputy assistant dispatched by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to try to de-escalate the crisis, met with Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz, who thanked the U.S. for its support.
Blinken himself headed out Sunday on an unrelated tour of Nordic countries, with no announced plans to stop in the Middle East in response to the crisis. He made calls from the plane to Egypt and other nations working to broker a cease-fire, telling Egypt that all parties “should de-escalate tensions and bring a halt to the violence.”
Rep. Adam Schiff, Democratic chairman of the House intelligence committee, on Sunday joined Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent, in calling on Biden to step up pressure on both sides to end current fighting and revive talks to resolve Israel's conflicts and flashpoints with the Palestinians.
“I think the administration needs to push harder on Israel and the Palestinian Authority to stop the violence, bring about a cease-fire, end these hostilities, and get back to a process of trying to resolve this long-standing conflict,” Schiff, a California Democrat, told CBS's “Face the Nation.”
Biden administration officials have urged calm but said nothing publicly about prodding Israel immediately to go along with a push by Egypt and others for a cease-fire. Thomas-Greenfield said U.S. diplomats were engaging with Israel, Egypt and Qatar, along with the U.N.
Israeli airstrikes on Gaza City flattened three buildings and killed at least 42 people Sunday, medics said, bringing the toll since Hamas and Israel opened their air and artillery battles to at least 188 killed in Gaza and eight in Israel. Some 55 children in Gaza and a 5-year-old boy in Israel were among the dead.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Israelis in a televised address Sunday that Israel “wants to levy a heavy price” on Gaza's militant Hamas rulers. That will “take time,” Netanyahu said, signaling the war would rage on for now.
Representatives of Muslim nations met to demand Israel halt attacks that are killing Palestinian civilians in the crowded Gaza strip. Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan called on “the international community to take urgent action to immediately stop military operations.”
The meeting of the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation also saw Turkey and some others criticize a U.S.-backed push under which the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and other Islamic nations signed bilateral deals with Israel to normalize their relations, stepping over the wreckage of collapsed international efforts to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinians long-term.
“The massacre of Palestinian children today follows the purported normalization,” Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said. the Kingdom calls on the international community to take urgent action to immediately stop military operations,
At the virtual meeting of the Security Council, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the U.N. was actively engaging all parties for an immediate cease-fire.
Returning to the scenes of Palestinian militant rocket fire and Israeli airstrikes in the fourth such war between Israel and Hamas, “only perpetuates the cycles of death, destruction and despair, and pushes farther to the horizon any hopes of coexistence and peace,” Guterres said.
Eight foreign ministers spoke at the Security Council session, reflecting the seriousness of the conflict, with almost all urging an end to the fighting.
Biden's predecessor, Donald Trump, had thrown U.S. support solidly behind Israel, embracing Netanyahu as an ally in Trump's focus on confronting Iran. Trump gave little time to efforts by past U.S. administrations to push peace accords between Israel and the Palestinians, instead encouraging and rewarding Arab nations that signed two-country normalization deals with Israel.
Biden, instead, calls Middle East and Central Asia conflicts a distraction from U.S. foreign policy priorities, including competition with China.
He's sought to calm some conflicts and extricate the U.S. from others, including ending U.S. military support for a Saudi-led war in Yemen, planning to pull U.S. troops from Afghanistan, and trying to return to a nuclear deal with Iran.
Biden officials haven't listed deeper Israel-Palestinian peace efforts at the top of their agenda.
The problem won't go away, said Tamara Cofman Wittes, a former deputy assistant secretary of state for the Middle East in the Obama administration.
Current fighting “reveals how deeply unstable is the ‘status quo’ between Israelis and Palestinians, and how urgently a new political path is needed to move this conflict toward negotiated resolution,” she said.
