White House national security spokesperson John Kirby on Thursday suggested that Israel agreed to a temporary pause in order for the two American hostages to be safely freed last month and said the U.S. would be working toward securing more pauses.

"The president already worked on one such pause when we were able to get those two Americans out. And that's, that's what we're kind of looking at," Kirby added. "When we're talking about humanitarian pause, what we're talking about are temporary, localized pauses in the fighting to meet a certain goal or goals -- as I said, get aid in, get people out."

He said the administration is exploring "as many pauses as might be necessary to continue to get aid out, and to continue to work to get people out safely, including hostages."

Israeli officials said there are 242 hostages in Gaza.

Kirby stressed that the administration isn't "advocating for a general cease-fire at this point."

"We believe that a general cease-fire would benefit Hamas in providing them breathing space and time to continue to plot and execute attacks on the Israeli people," he said.

-ABC News' Fritz Farrow

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who is en route to Israel and Jordan, said this trip he's focused on de-escalation and the plight of the Palestinians.

"We will be talking about concrete steps that can and should be taken to minimize harm to men, women and children in Gaza," Blinken said.

"When I see a Palestinian child, a boy or a girl, pulled from the rubble of a collapsed building -- that hits me in the gut as much as seeing a child in Israel or anywhere else. So this is something we have an obligation to respond to, and we will," he said.

The secretary identified three key goals for his trip.

"First, to talk to the Israeli government about the ongoing campaign against the Hamas terrorist organization," Blinken said. "Israel has not only the right but the obligation to defend itself, and also to take steps to try to make sure that this never happens again. … We've also said very clearly and repeatedly that how Israel does this matters. We will focus as well on steps that need to be taken to protect civilians who are in a crossfire of the Hamas’ making, and we want to look at concrete steps that can be taken to better protect them."

Blinken said his second objective is getting humanitarian aid into Gaza and getting people who want to leave out of Gaza.

Blinken said his third goal is to try to set the groundwork for a resolution to the conflict.

The secretary added that the administration is still "intensely focused" on the hostages in Gaza and "taking every possible step that we can in concert with others to secure their release."

-ABC News' Shannon Crawford

Forty-five aid trucks crossed from Egypt into Gaza through the Rafah border crossing on Thursday as the humanitarian crisis in Gaza worsens, the Palestinian spokesman for the border crossing, Wael Abu Omar, told ABC News.

A total of 300 trucks have now crossed from Egypt into Gaza since Oct. 21.

At least 342 foreign passport holders crossed from Gaza into Egypt via the Rafah border crossing on Thursday, according to Wael Abu Omar, the Palestinian spokesman for the border crossing.

A total of 677 foreign passport holders have crossed into Egypt from Gaza since Wednesday, he said.

Another 97 injured Palestinians have crossed into Egypt. Overall, 118 Palestinians have crossed into Egypt from Gaza, he said.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken defended Israel's military actions against Hamas at a Friday news conference in Israel after meeting with Israeli leaders, saying, "This right to self-defense, indeed, this obligation to self-defense, belongs to every nation. No country could, or should, tolerate the slaughter of innocents."

Blinken said during his Friday meetings with Israeli leaders he viewed more footage from Hamas' Oct. 7 attack, describing the videos as "almost beyond the human capacity to process."

In one video, he said, a father at a kibbutz grabbed his two sons, who appeared about 10 or 11 years old, and pulled them from the house into a shelter.

The family was "followed seconds later by a terrorist who throws a grenade into that small shelter," Blinken said.

When the dad came stumbling out of the shelter, he was shot, Blinken said.

The sons then ran from the shelter into the house, crying, "Where's daddy?" he said.

The terrorist then "casually opens the refrigerator and starts to eat from it," Blinken said.

"It is striking, and in some ways, shocking, that the brutality of the slaughter has receded so quickly in the memories of so many. But not in Israel and not in America," he said.

After sharing details of the terror inflicted on Israeli children during the conflict, Blinken touched on the images of young Palestinian boys and girls pulled from the rubble of buildings.

"When I see that, when I look into their eyes through the TV screen, I see my own children," he said.