Brett McGurk, the White House’s coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, will visit the region this week to try to advance the hostage deal and negotiate with Israel over the planned Rafah offensive, the White House announced on Tuesday, AFP and Agerpres note

McGurk will hold talks in Egypt on Wednesday and in Israel on Thursday, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said.

The trip comes as the United States and two other mediators, Qatar and Egypt, are trying to hammer out a new ceasefire ahead of Ramadan in early March that would allow for a week-long pause in fighting accompanied by the release of hostages. .

The purpose of the discussions held by McGurk is to see “if we can reach this agreement on the hostages,” Kirby told the press.

On the other hand, McGurk will echo President Joe Biden’s concerns about the Rafah operation without civilian protection, Kirby said.

Israel has rejected repeated calls to save Rafah, a city in the southern Gaza Strip where some 1.4 million displaced Palestinians have huddled after heavy shelling.

“Under the current circumstances, despite the safety of these refugees, we continue to believe that the Rafah operation will be a disaster,” Kirby said.

The United States on Tuesday vetoed a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, saying its passage would undermine ongoing talks.

In its unprecedented October 7 attack on Israeli territory, Hamas took about 250 hostages, 130 of whom are still in Gaza, 30 are believed to have died, according to Israel.

The attack killed an estimated 1,160 people in Israel, most of them civilians, according to a count compiled by AFP based on Israeli data.

Israel’s response has sparked a humanitarian disaster in Gaza, killing more than 29,000 people, mostly women and children, according to the latest Health Ministry figures in the Hamas-controlled territory.