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ABC News
2 days ago
- Politics
- ABC News
Donald Trump says Gaza is a 'mess' as Israel denies starvation crisis
US President Donald Trump has labelled Gaza "a mess" and says Israel would have to "make a decision" about its next steps in the strip, hours after aid restrictions were eased. Speaking at his golf course in Scotland, the president suggested Hamas had changed its stance on negotiations to release the 50 Israeli hostages the group still held captive, in exchange for a ceasefire in the war-ravaged strip. "They had a routine discussion the other day and all of a sudden [Hamas] hardened up," he said. "They don't want to give them back, and so Israel's going to have to make a decision." Mr Trump said the situation in Gaza had deteriorated dramatically. More than 100 humanitarian agencies had warned the strip was facing mass starvation, as Israeli restrictions on aid fuelled shortages of food and other supplies. Israel denied its actions had caused a starvation crisis, instead blaming Hamas for creating the situation. Palestinian health authorities said 133 people had died from starvation in the last week, with 87 of them children. "You know, when I see the children and when I see, especially over the last couple of weeks, and people are stealing the food, they're stealing the money, they're stealing the money for the food, they're stealing weapons, they're stealing everything," Mr Trump said. "It's a mess. That whole place is a mess." He suggested it was a mistake by then Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon to withdraw from Gaza, although he could not name which Israeli leader had been responsible for the move. "The Gaza Strip, you know, was given many years ago so that they could have peace — that didn't work out too well," he said. "When Israel gave that up, whoever was the prime minister at the time, who I know who it was — but it was not exactly a very clever thing to do, because that was given so that they finally have peace. "And it's actually made the situation worse." Ceasefire and hostage negotiations between Israel and Hamas have collapsed, with the White House's special envoy for the Middle East Steve Witkoff saying the militant group displayed a "lack of desire to reach" a deal. "There is no point in continuing negotiations under blockade, extermination and starvation of our children, women and people in the Gaza Strip," Hamas chief Khalil al-Hayya said on Sunday night. "The immediate and dignified entry of food and medications to our people is the real and serious expression of the viability of continuing negotiations." Despite the stalemate, Israel has bowed to international pressure over the humanitarian crisis which has developed in Gaza. The Netanyahu Government ordered a partial easing of the aid restrictions in the strip, with the changes coming into force on Sunday local time. Pallets of aid were dropped across Gaza by the Israeli, Jordanian and United Arab Emirates air forces, while the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it had established "secure corridors" for the United Nations and other agencies to distribute aid. There are reports that as many as 11 Palestinians were injured as the pallets fell on their tents. Even with more supplies entering Gaza, it remains a dangerous situation for Palestinians trying to secure supplies. The ABC found Alaa Abu Muteer, 47, lying on a thin mattress in the Al-Shifa hospital in a corridor full of injured Palestinians. "Currently, I am unemployed. I went to bring food for my children. I reached the location, and saw there Israeli tanks that began opening fire on the people, and I was shot in my back," he said. "I have [10] children. They are all hungry, and I am also hungry. "I am looking for a mouthful of bread. I now need treatment for the wounds that I have." The IDF told the ABC it was not aware of any shootings in the area. Marwari Al-Barari, 39, said she feared the aid situation in Gaza had fuelled a dangerous culture. "This has taught our children to use knives, things like that," she said. "I saw a 10-year-old boy carrying a knife. Where is he going to? He said he is going to the aid distribution." She said the airdrops were the wrong approach. "I fully reject it, because I was in the south and it happened in front of my eyes. The people were living next to me, and the parachutes came down," she said. "There was a boy, 12 years old, that was killed on the spot from a parachute. "Also, these parachutes cause the barbarism and killing and bullying and stabbing and so forth. I reject it in full." Israel has accused humanitarian organisations of refusing to pick up supplies which have been dropped on the Gaza side of the border fence. In response, Israel has been accused of making it too difficult and too dangerous to collect the supplies. "We have hundreds of trucks that are waiting on the Gazan side of the Kerem Shalom crossing," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said. "We've just announced that formally — here are safe corridors. "And the UN has no excuses left. No excuses left, stop lying. Stop finding excuses, do what you have to do, and stop accusing Israel deliberately of this egregious falsehood." The prime minister again denied there was a starvation crisis in Gaza, despite changing his government's policy in the strip and the international consensus on the situation. "Israel is presented as though we are applying a campaign of starvation in Gaza — what a bold-faced lie," Mr Netanyahu said. "There is no policy of starvation in Gaza, and there is no starvation in Gaza. "Hamas rob, steals this humanitarian aid and then accuses Israel of not supplying it." Aid agencies have repeatedly denied that there is any evidence of Hamas stealing food and other items. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, urged the international community to continue pressuring Israel to allow more aid in. "When we think it can't get worse, it gets worse," he said. "Children are starving and dying in front of our eyes. "Gaza is a dystopian landscape of deadly attacks and total destruction."
Mada
16-07-2025
- Politics
- Mada
Israel forces announce new ‘Magen Oz' corridor to cut off east Khan Younis amid truce talks
The Israeli Occupation military announced Wednesday that it has established a new 'corridor' in southern Gaza, an area cleared of buildings and farmland the military referred to as a 'security' zone. The new corridor, named Magen Oz, cuts eastern Khan Younis off from the west. A drone video of the Magen Oz corridor. Released by the IDF on July 16, 2025 The corridor is the latest of several zones that the Israeli military has carved through Gaza using wide-scale demolitions to divide the strip into separate regions and expand Israeli control over movement. Its establishment was preceded by dozens of military displacement orders for neighborhoods across Khan Younis, and comes as a delegation from Israel is due in Cairo to discuss a US-backed ceasefire — an agreement in which Israel's withdrawal from the besieged enclave is a major point of contention. The Israeli military said the corridor, which extends for 15 kilometers and adjoins the existing ' Morag ' zone that separated Khan Younis from Rafah, will be used mainly to pressure Hamas and try to defeat the Khan Younis brigade of the Qassam Brigades. An illustration of the Magen Oz and Morag corridors. Released by the IDF on July 16, 2025 The Israeli military began to clear and fortify zones within the strip in February 2024 in regions resembling the 'five fingers' plan of former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for the strip's occupation. It first established the Netsarim corridor to cut off areas of northern Gaza from the rest of the strip. Less than two months later, Israeli forces invaded the Rafah border crossing and took control of the Philadelphi corridor between Gaza and Egypt, effectively controlling the entire southern border of Palestinian Rafah. In March, weeks after Israel broke the ceasefire, the Occupation military gained full control over Rafah by establishing the Morag corridor, cutting Rafah completely from neighboring Khan Younis. The 'Mefalsim corridor,' also established since the ceasefire, cuts through northern Gaza to separate Gaza City from the rest of the north, while an incomplete corridor named 'Kissufim,' opened in November 2024, seeks to separate Deir al-Balah from Khan Younis. The corridors have been used to extend Israeli military ground control inside the strip and launch deadly advances targeting people in their homes or in streets across Gaza. Forces stationed to occupy the corridors have targeted civilians attempting to move between the separated areas, with documented instances of forces abducting and killing passing pedestrians, including young children. The continued presence of the occupied zones has been a major block to ceasefire negotiations. Hamas leader Bassem Naim said on Wednesday that the new axis does not constitute a major military shift given Israel's complete control over Gaza. It is, however, a clear indication of the Occupation's intention to remain inside the strip, Naim said. He stressed that, contrary to public statements, Israel has not submitted to negotiators any new maps of its military presence in Gaza, which, along with the new corridor, indicate that the Occupation government's participation in the negotiations falls solely within the framework of 'improving its image within Israel and easing international pressure.' Amid the renewed talks for a 60-day truce, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared his commitment to a post-truce plan to displace Palestinians in Gaza to a confined space in southern Gaza, between Morag and Philadelphi, and resume the war in full force until Hamas is disarmed. The establishment of the new corridor comes against the backdrop of the renewed ceasefire and prisoner release talks ushered by US President Donald Trump.
LeMonde
11-06-2025
- Politics
- LeMonde
The shadow of Israeli colonization over the Gaza Strip
The ongoing war in Gaza is the 15 th conflict waged by Israel in the Palestinian enclave, though it is by far the most devastating and deadly. The Gaza Strip itself is a product of the first Arab-Israeli war of 1948-1949, with the territory's demarcation based on the ceasefire lines negotiated between Israel and Egypt. The enclave that was defined was populated two-thirds by masses of refugees, expelled during the founding of the State of Israel. It concentrated a quarter of the Arab population of Palestine – now disappeared – into just 1% of its historic territory. The Gaza Strip was bound to become a hotbed of Palestinian nationalism, leaving two possible outcomes: Either Gaza would be part of a "two-state solution," finally reconciling Israeli and Palestinian nationalism, or Israel's refusal to resolve the Palestinian question would further fuel projects to eradicate the enclave as a national space. Legacy of three decades of colonization The Israeli military first occupied the Gaza Strip for four months in 1956-1957, a bloody occupation aimed at eradicating the fedayeen, as the Palestinian fighters were known. In June 1967, Israeli forces again seized the Gaza Strip, as well as East Jerusalem, which was effectively annexed, and the West Bank, which was soon opened to Israeli colonization. In Gaza, however, the occupiers faced four long years of low-intensity guerrilla warfare, which only General Ariel Sharon managed to crush in the summer of 1971. To achieve this, he brutally reconfigured the Palestinian enclave, forcibly displacing a tenth of its population and bulldozing new patrol routes. He divided the Gaza Strip into several hundred "blocks," a division the Israeli military would reinstate half a century later to expel the population from certain "blocks" during the current offensive. Yet Sharon was convinced that Israel's military dominance over Gaza could be guaranteed only by weaving the territory with Israeli settlements. He used the metaphor of five fingers to describe five east-west axes, connecting Israeli territory to the Mediterranean through settlements, in order to break the geographic and demographic continuity of the Palestinian enclave.
Asharq Al-Awsat
30-05-2025
- Business
- Asharq Al-Awsat
Israel Minister Says 'We Will Build Jewish Israeli State' in West Bank
Defense Minister Israel Katz vowed on Friday to build a "Jewish Israeli state" in the occupied West Bank, a day after the government announced the creation of 22 new settlements in the Palestinian territory. Israeli settlements in the West Bank, seen as a major obstacle to lasting peace, are regularly condemned by the United Nations as illegal under international law, and Thursday's announcement drew sharp foreign criticism. "This is a decisive response to the terrorist organizations that are trying to harm and weaken our hold on this land -- and it is also a clear message to (French President Emmanuel) Macron and his associates: they will recognize a Palestinian state on paper -- but we will build the Jewish Israeli state here on the ground," Katz was quoted as saying Friday in a statement from his office. "The paper will be thrown into the trash bin of history, and the State of Israel will flourish and prosper." Katz was speaking during a visit to the Sa-Nur settlement outpost in the northern West Bank. Sa-Nur was evacuated in 2005 as part of Israel's disengagement from Gaza, promoted by then prime minister Ariel Sharon. Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967. During a visit to Singapore on Friday, French President Macron asserted that recognition of a Palestinian state, with some conditions, was "not only a moral duty, but a political necessity". An international conference meant to resurrect the idea of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is set to take place in June at the UN headquarters in New York. A diplomat in Paris close to preparations for the conference said it should pave the way for more countries to recognize a Palestinian state. Macron said in April that France could recognize a Palestinian state in June. Following Israel's announcement of the new settlements on Thursday, Britain called the move a "deliberate obstacle" to Palestinian statehood, while UN chief Antonio Guterres's spokesman said it pushed efforts towards a two-state solution "in the wrong direction".
Arab News
30-05-2025
- Business
- Arab News
Israel minister says ‘we will build Jewish Israeli state' in West Bank
JERUSALEM: Defense Minister Israel Katz vowed on Friday to build a 'Jewish Israeli state' in the occupied West Bank, a day after the government announced the creation of 22 new settlements in the Palestinian territory. Israeli settlements in the West Bank, seen as a major obstacle to lasting peace, are regularly condemned by the United Nations as illegal under international law, and Thursday's announcement drew sharp foreign criticism. 'This is a decisive response to the terrorist organizations that are trying to harm and weaken our hold on this land — and it is also a clear message to (French President Emmanuel) Macron and his associates: they will recognize a Palestinian state on paper — but we will build the Jewish Israeli state here on the ground,' Katz was quoted as saying Friday in a statement from his office. 'The paper will be thrown into the trash bin of history, and the State of Israel will flourish and prosper.' Katz was speaking during a visit to the Sa-Nur settlement outpost in the northern West Bank. Sa-Nur was evacuated in 2005 as part of Israel's disengagement from Gaza, promoted by then prime minister Ariel Sharon. Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967. During a visit to Singapore on Friday, French President Macron asserted that recognition of a Palestinian state, with some conditions, was 'not only a moral duty, but a political necessity.' An international conference meant to resurrect the idea of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is set to take place in June at the UN headquarters in New York. A diplomat in Paris close to preparations for the conference said it should pave the way for more countries to recognize a Palestinian state. Macron said in April that France could recognize a Palestinian state in June. Following Israel's announcement of the new settlements on Thursday, Britain called the move a 'deliberate obstacle' to Palestinian statehood, while UN chief Antonio Guterres's spokesman said it pushed efforts toward a two-state solution 'in the wrong direction.'
