(NewsNation) — U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee says there’s “possibly” starvation in Gaza as he described what he saw at an aid distribution site amid recent reports that President Donald Trump has decided the U.S. should take over humanitarian aid efforts.
Huckabee appeared on “Elizabeth Vargas Reports” on Tuesday and doubled down on claims that Hamas is stealing aid sent to the war-torn region.
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When asked if he saw real starvation in Gaza, Huckabee said, “I think there is certainly hunger and deprivation and possibly starvation, particularly in the northern parts of Gaza controlled by Hamas.”
His remarks come after United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said Gaza is “on the brink of famine.”
“I don’t understand why so many world leaders and countries are putting all the pressure on Israel,” Huckabee told Vargas.
“The food is there. It’s not getting in, and when it does get in, even by the UN’s own assessment of it, 87% of it is stolen, looted, or taken directly off the trucks, and what the UN euphemistically is calling ‘self-distribution.'”
Vargas pushed back on that assertion, pointing out that a U.S. government assessment found only a small percentage of food is stolen by Hamas. Huckabee stood by his statement, insisting he didn’t “make up a number out of thin air.”
“So there is a problem, but I do believe that there’s an enormous amount of food going in, but Hamas is stealing the largest portion of it and then trying to sell it to the people who are hungry. It’s a disaster,” he said.
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The local director of the World Food Program had said that northern Gaza was “some of the harshest places one can imagine,” a far cry from what Huckabee found at one of the four aid distribution sites.
Huckabee insisted some food agencies didn’t want to take food that piled up, which could feed Gaza for two years, because they didn’t think it was safe.
“I saw a very different picture, certainly the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation mechanism of getting food to people,” he said.
“It’s not perfect, but it’s working. And it’s working because when the president ordered us to stand up a humanitarian program, there were two requirements: get food to the people who are hungry but to make sure that it’s not in a delivery method that Hamas can steal it.”
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Huckabee says the U.S. is taking the lead in Gaza despite reports that people are being injured and treated horribly. The GHF is an American-operated endeavor, and the organization has served over 106 million meals in two months.
“When people say the U.S. ought to be doing something, it has been doing something,” he said. “There have been hiccups, there have been difficulties.
“But the idea that there’s mass shootings and that a lot of people are being trampled — it’s simply not the case. And most of the information that says that comes from the Gaza Health Ministry.”
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