U.S. vows Gaza food plan after envoy visit

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories (AFP) -— President Donald Trump’s special envoy promised a plan to deliver more food to Gaza after inspecting a United States-backed distribution center on Friday, as the United Nations (UN) said Israeli 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 Israeli 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 27 May — 105 of them in the last two days of July.

“Most of these killings were committed by the Israeli 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.