The Crown Prince of Bahrain asked today, Friday to a “hostage exchange” was agreed between Hamas and Israel to achieve a cessation of hostilities which he said could lead to an end to the war in the Gaza Strip.

The prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa he also said that there will be no security without the implementation of the two-state solution and characterized “absolutely necessary” the involvement of the United States in its achievement.

“We must speak frankly,” he said, urging Hamas to release the women and children it is holding hostage in Gaza and Israelin exchange, to release Palestinian women and children who are “non-combatants,” as he said.

“The purpose is to pause so that people can take stock, bury their dead, finally begin to mourn and perhaps question the intelligence failure that led to this crisis,” he added.

Bahrain normalized relations with Israel in 2020, with the US-promoted Abraham Accords – in part because it worries about Shiite Iran’s influence in the region. Bahrain is an important US ally and hosts the US Fifth Fleet.

Bahrain’s parliament announced this month that Israel’s ambassador to Manama had left the country and the emirate’s ambassador to Israel. However, it remains unclear until now whether the Israeli diplomat was expelled.

Prince Salman described the situation in Gaza as “unbearable”. and condemned both Hamas for the October 7 attack and Israel’s airstrikes in the pouch. The “red lines” for Bahrain are the displacement of Palestinians “now or any time”, Israel’s recapture of Gaza and the military threat from Gaza to Israel, he said. He also called for elections to be held in the Palestinian Territories after the war ends, leading to a “just and lasting peace” with the establishment of a Palestinian state.

“This conflict has been an open wound for the Middle East for 80 years,” he noted.