President Donald Trump said the US will set up “food centers” in Gaza as he acknowledged Israel “has a lot of responsibility” for limiting aid to the region. A further 14 people have died in the last 24 hours in the ongoing starvation and malnutrition crisis in Gaza, the region’s health ministry said. The UN’s aid chief warned the coming days will be “make or break” for humanitarian efforts in Gaza as aid slowly trickles amid the Israel’s military daily pause in operations.
He acknowledged the challenges that have come with distributing food to the enclave, referencing images of Palestinians lining up for aid in the enclave facing. Asked by reporters about the “food centers” the US is planning to set up in Gaza and who will be responsible, Trump added, “the United States will be helping with the food” and “we’re also going to make sure they don’t have barriers, stopping people.”
Trump went on to talk about the barriers that Palestinians have faced in attempting to reach aid.
“You know, you’ve seen the areas where they actually have food, and the people are screaming for the food in there — they’re 35, 40 yards away, and they won’t let them because they have lines that are set up, and whether they’re set up by Hamas or whoever,” Trump said. “But they’re very strict lines, and we have to get rid of those lines, but we’re going to be getting some good, strong food. We can save a lot of people.”
Former British ambassador to the United States Peter Westmacott has said images of starving children in Gaza appear to have had a powerful impact.
“We are beginning to see some reaction,” he added, referring to the Israeli government’s recent talk of humanitarian pauses and attempts to get the humanitarian relief in.
“For a long time they’ve said, ‘oh, there’s no obstacle, there isn’t any famine, nobody’s starving, we’re not doing anything to block it.’ That demonstrably wasn’t true,” he said. “And now they are changing their mind a bit,” he added.
Credit: cnn.com
