U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken began his fourth diplomatic trip to the Middle East, which comes against the backdrop of the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli conflict. He plans to visit countries such as Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Egypt and Turkey, with the aim of using diplomatic good offices to contain further escalation of the conflict. Blinken stressed the importance of countries in the Middle East using their influence and relationships with relevant actors to control the situation, and called for the war to be contained to prevent the region from falling into an endless cycle of violence. As a superpower, the United States must also use diplomatic mediation when necessary to seek support from all sides. Blinken's trip to the Middle East is aimed at easing the current situation, but the main reason why the United States wants to call for the containment of war is because the current situation in the Middle East is not good for the United States. The U.S. wants to contain the war, as some conflicts could involve the U.S., at a time when the U.S. is more focused on more important global issues such as plaguing Russia, confronting Europe, and putting pressure on China. In this context, the United States, of course, hopes that peace will be restored in the Middle East. The United States has taken two different paths to the Middle East problem.
One is to "return to the Middle East" through heavy-handed means and use powerful forces to suppress all opposition forces, that is, to "drink filial piety with a stick";The other way is to rely on the joint efforts of the countries of the Middle East to "extinguish the fire". Obviously, the former will once again "plunge" the United States into the Middle East quagmire, while the latter is a method of "throwing a thousand pounds in four or two." Therefore, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's trip to the Middle East is aimed at "seeking help" and needs the support of many parties, including Turkey, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan and other countries, asking these countries to carry out a series of friendly actions around the Middle East issue. In order to achieve the set goals, Blinken has adopted three strategies. The first is to exert pressure, for example, on Israel, which the United States has been "pressing" to end the conflict before the end of the year or early in the new year. Sure enough, on the first day of the new year, Israel announced a gradual withdrawal of its troops, and the conflict also developed in a low-intensity direction. The second is currying favor, mainly to show curry favor with Turkey. Therefore, before visiting Turkey, Blinken first visited Greece, and Turkey and Greece have a territorial water dispute, and it is possible that the United States will persuade Greece to make some concessions and give Turkey some benefits in terms of equipment in order to make Turkey give up supporting Hamas.
Finally, to be reasonable, Blinken said that "it is in the interests of almost all countries in the Middle East to contain the war", and if the Palestinian-Israeli conflict expands, triggering the Lebanese-Israeli war and the Red Sea crisis, it will have an adverse impact on all countries, the Middle East region will fall into an "endless cycle of violence", and the people of the Middle East countries will live in insecurity and conflict. Blinken's trip is so important that even US spokesman Miller admitted that Washington "does not expect" Blinken to complete the task easily, and frankly said that the Middle East issue is "thorny and difficult". However, it is worth pointing out that Blinken is still expected to achieve some results. First of all, Israel has begun to cooperate with the United States, as evidenced by the withdrawal of troops. Secondly, Turkey can be bought, and their high-profile criticism of Israel and solidarity with Hamas are in fact nothing more than self-serving interests. Finally, there are indeed signs of moving closer to the United States in Middle Eastern countries, such as Egypt and Qatar demanding that Hamas "give up Gaza for peace", and the Houthi attack on merchant ships in the Red Sea has endangered the interests of Middle Eastern countries, and the Islamic world has begun to **.
Peace has always been the trend of the times, and Russia and Iran are trying to "catch" the United States through the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the Middle East crisis, forcing the United States to "trade" with Russia, and then "decently end" the Russia-Ukraine conflict, but I am afraid that this strategy will not be sustainable for a long time. As Israel began to withdraw its troops, the conflict in Gaza gradually reduced in intensity, and Putin's strategy had failed. If he wishes to continue to exert influence on the United States, he will have to act more drastically. However, this approach is not in the interests of the countries of the Middle East. At the same time, Blinken may use the means of co-optation, division, and enlisting to turn the situation in the Middle East in favor of the United States, forcing Putin to seek new countermeasures.