US promises Gaza food plan after Witkoff's visit
GAZA CITY: President Donald Trump's special envoy promised a plan to deliver more food to Gaza after inspecting a US-backed distribution centre on Friday, as the United Nations said Zionist forces had killed hundreds of hungry Palestinians waiting for aid over the past two months. The visit by US envoy Steve Witkoff came as a report from global advocacy group Human Rights Watch accused Zionist forces of presiding over 'regular bloodbaths' close to aid points run by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
The UN human rights office in the Palestinian territories said at least 1,373 Palestinians seeking aid in Gaza had been killed since May 27 - 105 of them in the last two days of July.
'Most of these killings were committed by the Zionist military,' the UN office said, breaking down the death toll into 859 killed near GHF sites and 514 along routes used by UN and aid agency convoys. Witkoff said he had spent more than five hours inside Gaza, in an online post accompanied by a photograph of himself wearing a protective vest and meeting staff at a GHF distribution centre. The visit intended to give Trump 'a clear understanding of the humanitarian situation and help craft a plan to deliver food and medical aid to the people of Gaza,' Witkoff said. Trump echoed this in a phone call with US news site Axios touting a plan to 'get people fed'. 'We want to help people. We want to help them live. We want to get people fed. It is something that should have happened long time ago,' Trump said according to Axios.
The US president did not say whether his plan would involve reinforcing GHF or a whole new mechanism, the report said. The GHF largely sidelined the longstanding UN-led aid distribution system in Gaza just as Zionist entity in late May began easing a more than two-month aid blockade that exacerbated existing shortages. The foundation said it had delivered its 100-millionth meal in Gaza during the visit by Witkoff and US ambassador Mike Huckabee. Gaza's civil defenSe agency said 22 people were killed by Zionist gunfire and air strikes on Friday, including eight who were waiting to collect food aid.
In its report on the GHF centers, Human Rights Watch accused the Zionist entityi military of using starvation as a weapon of war. 'Zionist forces are not only deliberately starving Palestinian civilians, but they are now gunning them down almost every day as they desperately seek food for their families,' said HRW's associate crisis and conflict director, Belkis Wille.
'US-backed Zionist forces and private contractors have put in place a flawed, militarized aid distribution system that has turned aid distributions into regular bloodbaths.' The Zionist military said in response that the GHF worked independently, but that troops operated near aid sites 'to enable the orderly delivery of food' while trying to 'minimize... any friction between the civilian population' and its forces. — AFP
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