Abu Dhabi — President Trump said Friday that the United States would have the situation in Gaza “taken care of,” telling reporters that people were starving in the besieged Palestinian territory, echoing a warning that aid agencies have repeated for months.
“We’re looking at Gaza. And we’re going to get that taken care of. A lot of people are starving,” the president told reporters.
The brief comments came as Mr. Trump concluded the final leg of a multi-day tour of Arab nations in the Middle East, including Qatar, which has been a key partner with the U.S. and Egypt in trying to broker a ceasefire in the war between Israel and Hamas.
Israel has imposed a blockade for over two months on Gaza, leading United Nations agencies and other humanitarian groups to warn of rapidly dwindling fuel, food and medicine supplies in the Palestinian territory that, before the war, was home to about 2.4 million people.
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Israel has repeatedly denied that there is a humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, and it blames the suffering of the enclave’s civilian population entirely on Hamas, which sparked the war with its unprecedented Oct. 7 2023 terrorist attack on Israel.
Mr. Trump’s remarks came a day after U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio voiced openness to any new ideas to bring aid into Gaza, after a U.S.- and Israeli-backed plan was widely criticized, while also expressing concern over the humanitarian situation in the territory.
Relentless Israeli strikes kill dozens in Gaza
Gaza’s civil defense rescue agency said Friday that 50 people had been killed in Israeli strikes on the Palestinian territory since midnight.
“The number of martyrs killed in Israeli shelling targeting civilian homes in the northern Gaza Strip between midnight and early this morning has risen to 50… Our teams are still working in those areas,” civil defense official Mohammed al-Mughayyir told AFP.
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“The Israeli occupation bombed the house next to mine, hitting it directly while its residents were inside,” Yousef Al-Sultan, 40, from the al-Salatin area, west of Beit Lahia, told AFP, reporting “air strikes, artillery shelling and gunfire from quadcopter drones.”
“There is a massive wave of displacement among civilians. Fear and panic grip us in the middle of the night,” he said.
Head of the U.N. Children’s Fund, Catherine Russell, said Friday in a message posted on social media that Israel’s operations in Gaza had reportedly killed 45 children in just two days, which she called “unconscionable.”
“This should shock the world but is largely met with indifference,” Russell wrote. “Nowhere is safe for children in Gaza. This horror must stop.”
She warned that more than 1 million children in Gaza were at risk of starvation, “deprived of food, water and medicine.”
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There was no immediate comment on the latest strikes in northern Gaza by the Israel Defense Forces, but Israeli media said it was part of a stepped-up operation that would include new ground incursions into the area. The IDF has said since the beginning of the war that it only targets Hamas and other terrorist groups in Gaza, which it accuses of hiding weapons and fighters in civilian infrastructure.
Qatar and hostage families call on Netanyahu to make a deal
Hamas and allied groups seized 251 people, many of them civilians, during the Oct. 7 attack and killed about 1,200, according to Israeli officials. The hostages were brought back into Gaza, and most have been released during two separate ceasefires. Israeli officials believe 58 remain in captivity inside Gaza, about 20 of whom are still thought to be alive.
The hostages’ families have led protests for months demanding that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu negotiate a ceasefire with Hamas to secure the remaining captives’ release, and they voiced new concern on Friday over the escalating military operations in Gaza, which they say puts their loved ones at increasing risk.
With President Trump now set to conclude a three-nation Middle East trip — which notably did not include a stop in Israel — the families have ramped up pressure on Netanyahu to back the American leader’s calls for a negotiated resolution with Hamas.
“The hostages’ families woke up this morning with heavy hearts and great concern in light of reports about increased attacks in Gaza and the imminent conclusion of President Trump’s visit to the region,” the Hostages and Missing Families Forum organization said in a statement on Friday. “We are in dramatic hours that will determine the future of our loved ones, the future of Israeli society, and the future of the Middle East. Missing this historic opportunity would be a resounding failure that will be remembered in infamy forever. We call on Prime Minister Netanyahu to join hands with President Trump’s efforts, which will lead first and foremost to the release of 58 hostages and to extensive regional agreements. Time is running out, the world is watching, and history will remember.”
Netanyahu’s government has vowed to continue the war in Gaza until all of its goals are met. It says those goals include the release of all remaining hostages, the “military and governmental defeat of Hamas,” and ensuring that Gaza “will no longer pose a threat to Israel.”
There was fleeting hope for a potential breakthrough in long-running negotiations earlier this week when Hamas, in a deal negotiated directly with the Trump administration, released the last living U.S. national who had been among the hostages, Edan Alexander.
On Wednesday, as President Trump visited the country, Qatar’s Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani lamented Israel’s mounting assault in Gaza on the heels of Alexander’s release, saying in an interview with CNN that it raised doubts about the prospects of ongoing diplomatic efforts.
“Unfortunately, Israeli reaction to this was a mass bombing the next day,” said al-Thani, adding that, along with “statements coming out of the Israeli government” about not ending the war “is basically sending the signal that we [Israel] are not interested in negotiations.”
The top Qatari diplomat stressed that the country’s negotiating team remained engaged with all parties in the conflict, and “we hope to see some progress,” but he cautioned: “I’m not sure if this progress will be something seen very soon with this continuing behavior.”
“If there is no willingness to engage in meaningful negotiations, then how can we reach the solution?” he asked.
Thus far the Trump administration has shown no willingness to increase pressure on Netanyahu by constraining its vital military aid for Israel.
The Hamas-run Ministry of Health in Gaza said Thursday that the death toll in the Palestinian enclave since the war began had reached 53,010, including 2,876 people killed and nearly 8,000 injured since Israel resumed ground operations on March 18, when it ended the last ceasefire.