ROME: Daily life has become “apocalyptic” in parts of southern Gaza since Israel moved into the city of Rafah, though the situation in the north is improving, the UN’s food agency said Friday.
“The exodus that we’ve seen in the past 20 days or so out of Rafah has been an awesome and horrific experience for many, many people,” Matthew Hollingworth, the World Food Programme (WFP) director for the Palestinian territories.
They have fled the fighting to areas where there was not enough water, health care or fuel, where food was limited, telecommunications had stopped and there was not enough space to dig pit latrines, Hollingworth told an online briefing.
The public health situation was “beyond crisis levels,” he said, adding: “The sounds and smells of everyday life are horrific and apocalyptic.”
People “sleep to the sounds of war... and they wake to the same sounds,” he said.
The WFP was able to provide “ever decreasing amounts of assistance,” with all of its bakeries in Rafah closed due to a lack of fuel and supplies, he said.
From May 7 — when Israeli tanks and troops entered Rafah’s east — to May 20, “not a single WFP truck crossed from the southern corridors from Egypt,” Hollingworth said.
The WFP also lost access to its main warehouse in the south of the Gaza Strip because it was in an evacuation zone, with 2,700 tons of food either looted or destroyed in fighting.
Hollingworth said the WFP was serving around 27,000 people with hot meals in Rafah — “but that’s not enough.”
In central areas of the Gaza Strip, where many people fled, the WFP is providing around 400,000 hot meals a day, and has kept six bakeries functioning.
Commercial food is also getting in, he said, but many people have no money, with some even resorting to trading their identity cards — which they need if they want to register for aid.
Hollingworth said aid trucks from Egypt had begun entering the Gaza Strip through the Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing.
“Since May 20, we have started to get a trickle of assistance in,” he said, though he warned the security situation was still slowing down the deliveries.
“That has to turn into a flood of assistance if we’re going to ensure we don’t start seeing the most acute forms of hunger becoming more common,” he said.
In the north of the Palestinian territory, by contrast, where UN agencies warned of imminent famine in March, Hollingworth said the situation was improving.
With the opening of crossings, around 12,000 tons of inter-agency assistance, mostly food, had been delivered since May 1.
“There has been a step change in terms of availability of food,” he said, though problems of health care, clean water supply and sewage remained.
The United States has built a temporary pier into Gaza, but it was damaged in poor weather, suspending deliveries.
During the two weeks it was open, about 1,000 tons of inter-agency aid moved through the pier, Hollingworth said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said his government is doing everything to avoid famine in Gaza, and noted a study saying that calorie consumption in the territory was 3,200 a day — more than enough.
“I have not seen anybody, aid workers alike who live off protein bars, eat 3,000 calories or more in Gaza,” Hollingworth said.
The Gaza war was sparked by Hamas’s October 7 attack on southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,189 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.
Militants also took 252 hostages, 121 of whom remain in Gaza, including 37 the army says are dead.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 36,284 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.
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WFP warns of ‘apocalyptic’ scenes in southern Gaza
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WFP warns of ‘apocalyptic’ scenes in southern Gaza
- The public health situation was “beyond crisis levels” Matthew Hollingworth, WFP director for the Palestinian territories said
- From May 7 — when Israeli tanks and troops entered Rafah’s east — to May 20, “not a single WFP truck crossed from the southern corridors from Egypt,” Hollingworth said
Trump says ‘someone from within’ Iranian regime might be best choice to lead once war ends
- Trump had earlier called on Iranians to “take over your government” once the war US-Israel strikes end
- He now appears to drift away from the idea of putting an end Iran's theocratic rule
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that “someone from within” the Iranian regime might be the best choice to take power once the US-Israel military campaign is completed — but said “most of the people we had in mind are dead.”
The president, who four days ago had emphatically called on Iranians to “take over your government” once the US-Israel bombardment ends, appeared to drift further away from the idea that the war presents an opportunity to end the theocratic rule that has been in place since the country’s 1979 Islamic revolution.
Trump said that many Iranian officials his administration had viewed as potential new leaders for the country had been killed in the US-Israeli campaign that killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and many other top officials.
Trump has not publicly identified anyone whom he views as a credible future leader for Iran. And it’s unclear what, if any, outreach the White House had with Iranian officials since the war started.
“Most of the people we had in mind are dead,” he said in an exchange with reporters in the Oval Office. “Now we have another group, they may be dead also, based on reports. So you have a third wave coming. Pretty soon we’re not going to know anybody.”
Trump said Reza Pahlavi, the exiled crown prince of Iran’s last shah who is trying to position himself for a return should Iran’s Shiite theocracy fall, is not someone that his administration has considered in depth to take over leadership in Iran.
“It would seem to me that somebody from within maybe would be more appropriate,” Trump said, adding that it may make sense for “somebody that’s there, that’s currently popular, if there is such a person” to emerge from the power vacuum.
Trump’s comments came as he hosted German Chancellor Friedrich Merz for his first in-person engagement with a foreign leader since the US and Israel launched the war against Iran.
Trump said he wanted to avoid a “worst case” scenario where “somebody takes over who’s as bad as the previous person.”
“That could happen. We don’t want that to happen,” Trump added. “You go through this, and then in five years you realize you put somebody in who was no better.”
The White House is trying to counter criticism
The White House has stepped up its push to counter criticism that it moved unnecessarily quickly to launch a war of choice against Iran.
Trump’s decision to strike last week followed lengthy negotiations by the president’s envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner with the Iranians — talks the US increasingly viewed as an effort to stall any progress.
After the most recent round of discussions in Geneva, Switzerland, last week, Witkoff and Kushner told Trump that reaching a nuclear agreement similar to one that former President Barack Obama struck in 2015 was possible, according to a senior administration official.
The official, who briefed journalists on condition of anonymity, described it as a potential “Obama-plus deal” and Witkoff and Kushner believed such an agreement would take months, but was possible.
Still, even as they expressed their willingness to pursue diplomacy and “fight for every point that we can” if that’s what Trump wanted, the negotiators stressed to the president that the Iranians were not willing to make a deal that would be satisfactory to the US
Trump snaps at the UK, Spain over lack of support
Meanwhile, Trump sharply criticized Britain and Spain for their reluctance to aid the US-Israeli strikes on Iran.
“This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with,” Trump fumed about British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Starmer had initially blocked American planes from using British bases for the attacks on Iran that started on Saturday. He later agreed to let the United States use bases in England and on Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean to strike Iran’s ballistic missiles and their storage sites, but not to hit other targets.
Trump also said he was going to “cut off all trade with Spain,” the day after Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said his country would not allow the US to use jointly operated bases in southern Spain in any strikes not covered by the United Nations’ charter.
Trump disputes that Israel forced his hand
The president also sought to push back on criticism from some of his staunchest allies over the decision to go to war — questions that grew louder after Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Monday that the US had decided to strike because “we knew that there was going to be an Israeli action.”
“And we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties,” Rubio said.
But Trump rejected the notion that the White House had been dragged into the conflict by Israel. “We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they were going to attack,” Trump said. “If anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand.”
Rubio on Tuesday echoed Trump’s insistence that the decision to attack Iran was made independent of Israel.
Merz said during his visit with Trump at the Oval Office that Germany is “looking forward to the day after” the Iran war is over.
He said Berlin wants to work with the US on a strategy for when the current Iranian government no longer exists.
“We are having a high interest in common approach and common work and what we can do,” Merz said. “And this is this is important not just for the Americans,” he said. “This is extremely important for Europe and extremely important for Israel and their security.”
Merz also noted surging oil prices were damaging the world economy, laying down an argument for finding a quick endgame to the conflict.
The president acknowledged that oil and gas prices were going to rise as the US remains engaged in the strikes — yet argued it would be fleeting.
“We have a little high oil prices for a little while, but as soon as this ends, those prices are going to drop, I believe, lower than even before,” Trump said.
The average price for a gallon of gasoline in the US jumped 11 cents overnight Tuesday to about $3.11 in the United States, according to the AAA.
The president, who four days ago had emphatically called on Iranians to “take over your government” once the US-Israel bombardment ends, appeared to drift further away from the idea that the war presents an opportunity to end the theocratic rule that has been in place since the country’s 1979 Islamic revolution.
Trump said that many Iranian officials his administration had viewed as potential new leaders for the country had been killed in the US-Israeli campaign that killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and many other top officials.
Trump has not publicly identified anyone whom he views as a credible future leader for Iran. And it’s unclear what, if any, outreach the White House had with Iranian officials since the war started.
“Most of the people we had in mind are dead,” he said in an exchange with reporters in the Oval Office. “Now we have another group, they may be dead also, based on reports. So you have a third wave coming. Pretty soon we’re not going to know anybody.”
Trump said Reza Pahlavi, the exiled crown prince of Iran’s last shah who is trying to position himself for a return should Iran’s Shiite theocracy fall, is not someone that his administration has considered in depth to take over leadership in Iran.
“It would seem to me that somebody from within maybe would be more appropriate,” Trump said, adding that it may make sense for “somebody that’s there, that’s currently popular, if there is such a person” to emerge from the power vacuum.
Trump’s comments came as he hosted German Chancellor Friedrich Merz for his first in-person engagement with a foreign leader since the US and Israel launched the war against Iran.
Trump said he wanted to avoid a “worst case” scenario where “somebody takes over who’s as bad as the previous person.”
“That could happen. We don’t want that to happen,” Trump added. “You go through this, and then in five years you realize you put somebody in who was no better.”
The White House is trying to counter criticism
The White House has stepped up its push to counter criticism that it moved unnecessarily quickly to launch a war of choice against Iran.
Trump’s decision to strike last week followed lengthy negotiations by the president’s envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner with the Iranians — talks the US increasingly viewed as an effort to stall any progress.
After the most recent round of discussions in Geneva, Switzerland, last week, Witkoff and Kushner told Trump that reaching a nuclear agreement similar to one that former President Barack Obama struck in 2015 was possible, according to a senior administration official.
The official, who briefed journalists on condition of anonymity, described it as a potential “Obama-plus deal” and Witkoff and Kushner believed such an agreement would take months, but was possible.
Still, even as they expressed their willingness to pursue diplomacy and “fight for every point that we can” if that’s what Trump wanted, the negotiators stressed to the president that the Iranians were not willing to make a deal that would be satisfactory to the US
Trump snaps at the UK, Spain over lack of support
Meanwhile, Trump sharply criticized Britain and Spain for their reluctance to aid the US-Israeli strikes on Iran.
“This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with,” Trump fumed about British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Starmer had initially blocked American planes from using British bases for the attacks on Iran that started on Saturday. He later agreed to let the United States use bases in England and on Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean to strike Iran’s ballistic missiles and their storage sites, but not to hit other targets.
Trump also said he was going to “cut off all trade with Spain,” the day after Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said his country would not allow the US to use jointly operated bases in southern Spain in any strikes not covered by the United Nations’ charter.
Trump disputes that Israel forced his hand
The president also sought to push back on criticism from some of his staunchest allies over the decision to go to war — questions that grew louder after Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Monday that the US had decided to strike because “we knew that there was going to be an Israeli action.”
“And we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties,” Rubio said.
But Trump rejected the notion that the White House had been dragged into the conflict by Israel. “We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they were going to attack,” Trump said. “If anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand.”
Rubio on Tuesday echoed Trump’s insistence that the decision to attack Iran was made independent of Israel.
Merz said during his visit with Trump at the Oval Office that Germany is “looking forward to the day after” the Iran war is over.
He said Berlin wants to work with the US on a strategy for when the current Iranian government no longer exists.
“We are having a high interest in common approach and common work and what we can do,” Merz said. “And this is this is important not just for the Americans,” he said. “This is extremely important for Europe and extremely important for Israel and their security.”
Merz also noted surging oil prices were damaging the world economy, laying down an argument for finding a quick endgame to the conflict.
The president acknowledged that oil and gas prices were going to rise as the US remains engaged in the strikes — yet argued it would be fleeting.
“We have a little high oil prices for a little while, but as soon as this ends, those prices are going to drop, I believe, lower than even before,” Trump said.
The average price for a gallon of gasoline in the US jumped 11 cents overnight Tuesday to about $3.11 in the United States, according to the AAA.
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