The current situation in the Middle East is more dangerous than at any time in the last four decades, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said yesterday.

“I would argue that we haven’t seen a situation as dangerous as the one we’re facing today in the region since at least 1973. Maybe even before that,” the head of US diplomacy said during a joint press conference with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. in Washington. “This is the environment in which we operate.”

Mr. Blinken was apparently referring to October 6, 1973, when an alliance of Arab states, led by Egypt and Syria, attacked Israel on the day it celebrates Yom Kippur. The armed conflict, known as the Yom Kippur War, lasted 19 days.

The fighting took place primarily in the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights. Based on Israeli records, over 2,600 members of the Israeli armed forces were killed.

Last Sunday, three US servicemen were killed in a drone attack on a US support base on the Jordan/Syria border, heightening fears of a Middle East flare-up. US President Joe Biden blamed “extremist armed groups supported by Iran operating in Syria and Iraq” and said Washington would retaliate for the attack. Yesterday, Monday, Iran’s diplomacy emphasized that it had nothing to do with energy.

Tensions are rising in the Middle East against the backdrop of the Israel/Hamas war in the Gaza Strip. Washington has repeatedly assured that it does not want to see this war spread.

The US Secretary of State warned yesterday against attempts to exploit the war to cause further instability, stressing that Washington would react “decisively” to any such, but taking measures to avoid regional conflagration.

U.S. forces and an anti-jihad coalition formed in 2014 have been targeted in at least 165 attacks since mid-October, 66 in Iraq, 98 in Syria and one in Jordan, with rockets, drones, mortars, and short-range ballistic missiles. range, a Pentagon official listed yesterday. Washington has repeatedly launched retaliatory strikes in Iraq and Syria.

Meanwhile, Yemen’s Houthi rebels are continuing drone and missile attacks on merchant ships in the Red Sea in a show of “solidarity” with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, despite a series of US and British bombardments backed by other allies. , against the positions of the Shia movement that controls a large part of the poorest country on the Arabian Peninsula and is also considered adjacent to Iran.