US President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff has visited an aid distribution site in Gaza run by the American privately owned Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
Mr Witkoff appeared in a number of photos taken in Gaza and shared by the US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee on X, as the pair toured a GHF distribution point.
“This morning I joined Steve Witkoff for a visit to Gaza to learn the truth about (GHF) aid sites,” the diplomat tweeted.
The special envoy arrived in Israel yesterday as part of a renewed US effort to mediate a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas after negotiations broke down last week, and to discuss the situation in Gaza, a US official said.
Israeli restrictions on the entry of goods and aid into Gaza since the start of the war nearly 22 months ago have led to shortages of food and essential goods, including medicine, medical supplies and fuel, which hospitals rely on to power their generators.Menu
Donald Trump’s envoy Witkoff visits Gaza food site
Updated / Friday, 1 Aug 2025 19:22
US President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff has visited an aid distribution site in Gaza run by the American privately owned Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
Mr Witkoff appeared in a number of photos taken in Gaza and shared by the US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee on X, as the pair toured a GHF distribution point.
“This morning I joined Steve Witkoff for a visit to Gaza to learn the truth about (GHF) aid sites,” the diplomat tweeted.
The special envoy arrived in Israel yesterday as part of a renewed US effort to mediate a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas after negotiations broke down last week, and to discuss the situation in Gaza, a US official said.
Israeli restrictions on the entry of goods and aid into Gaza since the start of the war nearly 22 months ago have led to shortages of food and essential goods, including medicine, medical supplies and fuel, which hospitals rely on to power their generators.
Steve Witkoff and Mike Huckabee leave a helicopter in Gaza en route to an aid site
Steve Witkoff appeared in a number of photos taken in Gaza (Credit: X – Mike Huckabee – @ISAmbIsrael)
Earlier, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that Mr Witkoff, who visited Gaza in January, would inspect “distribution sites and secure a plan to deliver more food and meet with local Gazans to hear first hand about this dire situation on the ground”.
German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul also met Mr Netanyahu in Jerusalem, and afterwards declared: “The humanitarian disaster in Gaza is beyond imagination.
“Here, the Israeli government must act quickly, safely and effectively to provide humanitarian and medical aid to prevent mass starvation from becoming a reality.
“I have the impression that this has been understood today.”
US President Donald Trump’s envoy met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last night
US envoy Steve Witkoff met Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of a visit to inspect aid distribution in Gaza
Meanwhile, the UN human rights office has said that 1,373 Palestinians have been killed while waiting for aid in Gaza since late May, most of them by the Israeli military.
“In total, since 27 May, at least 1,373 Palestinians have been killed while seeking food; 859 in the vicinity of (US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation) sites and 514 along the routes of food convoys,” the UN agency’s office for the Palestinian territories said in a statement.
“Most of these killings were committed by the Israeli military,” it added.
Gaza civil defence says Israeli fire kills 22
Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli gunfire and air strikes have killed at least 22 people today, including eight who were waiting to collect food aid in the war-battered Palestinian territory.
Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said that five people were killed in a strike in the southern Gaza Strip, and four more when a vehicle was hit in the central area of Deir el-Balah.
Mr Bassal said Israeli forces killed five Palestinians who were trying to return to the Gaza City area, in the territory’s north, after word had spread that troops had withdrawn from there.
There was no comment from the Israeli military, which told AFP it could not confirm any of the incidents without specific coordinates for each of them.
The civil defence agency reported deadly fire at Palestinians who were seeking humanitarian aid.
Mr Bassal said six people were killed by Israeli gunfire while waiting near northern Gaza’s Zikim crossing, through which aid trucks have entered from Israel in recent weeks.
Israeli fire on a crowd near an aid distribution site in southern Gaza killed two people and wounded 70 others, the civil defence said.
The Israeli military did not comment on the latest reports, while the GHF has denied that fatal shootings have occurred in the immediate vicinity of its aid points.
