Blinken’s arrival coincided with the start of a hearing at the UN's top court over accusations by South Africa who says Israel has committed "genocidal acts" in Gaza.
Adila Hassim, a top lawyer for South Africa which has brought the case against Israel, said "the situation is such that the experts are now predicting that more people in Gaza may die from starvation and disease" than from military action.
In Egypt’s capital, Cairo, Blinken met President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, a mediator in the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas that has entered its fourth month.
A nine-country Middle East trip by the U.S. Secretary concludes after Wednesday's U.N. Security Council resolution that demanded Iran-backed Yemeni rebels "immediately cease" attacks which have disrupted shipping in the Red Sea.
South Africa accused Israel before the International Court of Justice, ICJ, of breaching the United Nations Genocide convention in its response to Hamas's October 7 attack, which triggered the war.
"No armed attack on a state territory no matter how serious... can provide justification for or defend breaches of the convention," said Pretoria's Justice Minister Ronald Lamola, setting out his country's case at the court.
South Africa, a longtime backer of the Palestinian cause, has lodged an urgent ICJ appeal to force Israel to "immediately suspend" its military operations in Gaza.
FILE - Palestinian sympathizers take part in a demonstration during a hearing at the International Court of Justice on a genocide complaint by South Africa against Israel, in The Hague, on January 11, 2024.
In Gaza's southern city of Rafah, on the border with Egypt and overrun with displaced people fleeing fighting further north, Palestinians expressed hope the ICJ could render justice on their behalf.
"Israel considers itself above the law. We ask from the international judges to judge Israel," and its government," said Hisham al-Kullah.
Another Rafah resident, Mohammad al-Arjan, expressed hope that "the court stops the war."
Blinken has dismissed the case as "meritless" and Israel's president called it "atrocious and preposterous."
The war began when Hamas launched its unprecedented October 7 attack, which resulted in about 1,140 deaths in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.
Militants also took around 250 hostages, 132 of whom Israel says remain in Gaza, including at least 25 believed to have been killed.
FILE - A protestor wearing a kippa attends a demonstration simultaneously at the hearing at the ICJ on a genocide complaint by South Africa against Israel, in The Hague, January 11, 2024.
Israel has responded with a relentless military campaign that has killed at least 23,357 people, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.
Hamas's press office said early Thursday that 62 people had been killed in strikes overnight, including around Gaza's main southern city of Khan Yunis.
Israel's military said in a statement on Thursday that "underground combat" led to the discovery of more than 300 tunnel shafts under Khan Yunis, and that "Israeli hostages had been inside" one vast tunnel.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said an Israeli strike on an ambulance in central Gaza killed four medics and two other passengers on Wednesday.
Israel's military did not immediately comment on the incident when contacted by AFP.
During a visit with troops in central Gaza, Israeli army chief Herzi Halevi said the militants had prepared their defenses "over a very long period of time in a very organized way" adding it is "a very, very complex battlefield."
The war between the rivals in the Middle East has triggered an acute humanitarian crisis, with an Israeli siege sparking shortages of food, water, fuel and medicine.
World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Wednesday said there are "nearly insurmountable challenges" to aid delivery in Gaza.
"Intense bombardment, restrictions on movement, fuel shortages, and interrupted communications make it impossible for WHO and our partners to reach those in need," he told reporters.
WHO says only a few Gaza hospitals are even partly functioning.
In Rafah, former Gaza health ministry staffer Zaki Shaheen converted his shop into a makeshift clinic.
"We decided to open a medical department, and we got help from the health ministry," aiming to ease pressure on overburdened hospitals, Shaheen said.
"We receive no less than 30 or 40 cases per day, morning to night. I'll be sleeping, then someone comes in with an injury or a burn, so we treat them," he added, with a stethoscope around his neck, a jumble of medical supplies to his right, and an empty Coca-Cola fridge on his left.
The United Nations estimates 1.9 million Gazans have been uprooted by the war.
Before his final stop in Egypt, Blinken sketched out a possible post-war future for Gaza after meeting Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, and Bahrain's King Hamad bin Isa Al-Khalifa on Wednesday.
Blinken told Abbas that Washington supported "tangible steps" towards the creation of a Palestinian state — a long-term goal that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-right government has opposed.
In Bahrain, Blinken said Abbas was "committed" to reforming the Palestinian Authority "so that it can effectively take responsibility for Gaza, so that Gaza and the West Bank can be reunited under a Palestinian leadership."
Abbas, 88, is widely unpopular in the West Bank, where the Palestinian Authority has partial administrative control, and the Israel-Hamas war has led to increased popular support for the Palestinian militant group.
Violence in the Middle East involving Iran-backed armed groups in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen has spiked amid the war between Israel and Hamas, leading to heightened fears of a wider conflict.
FILE - A Yemeni child hold a knife next to a portrait of Huthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi during a march in solidarity with the people of Gaza in the Huthi-controlled capital Sanaa on January 5, 2024 amid the ongoing battles between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
Yemen's Huthi rebels, who say they are acting in support of the Palestinians, have carried out numerous attacks on merchant ships in the Red Sea, a vital artery for international trade.
Washington has set up a multinational naval task force to protect shipping from the attacks, which Blinken on Wednesday said were "aided and abetted" by Iran and would bring "consequences" if they continue.
On Thursday armed men in "military-style" uniforms boarded an oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman, a maritime risk management company said.