MOSCOW, December 7. /TASS/. The Palestinian-Israeli standoff is not likely to end in the near future, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told the Soloviev Live TV channel.

"The current situation has been provoked by the United States of America, by its recklessness in exercising its exceptionalism which they flaunt everywhere, in this case, in the Middle East, [it] led to a catastrophe on a previously unseen scale. <…> As all political science experts write, and this is obvious, there is, unfortunately, no hope that this will be over any time soon," the diplomat said.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 when militants from the Gaza-based Palestinian radical group Hamas staged a surprise incursion into Israeli territory from the Gaza Strip. Hamas described its attack as a response to the aggressive actions of Israeli authorities against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. In response, Israel has declared a state of war readiness; announced a total blockade of the Gaza Strip, home to 2.3 million Palestinians; and began delivering air strikes on the enclave and certain parts of Lebanon and Syria. Clashes are underway in the West Bank as well.