Trump says his priority to ensure Gazans are ‘getting fed,’ shrugs off push to recognize Palestinian state

WASHINGTON — President Trump said Monday that he isn’t “going to take a position” on recognizing Palestinian statehood — and that his focus is on ensuring starving Palestinians are fed.

“I’m not going to take a position. I don’t mind him [British Prime Minister Keir Starmer] taking a position,” the president said when asked about Starmer’s assertion that recognition of a Palestinian state is a step toward peace.

“I’m looking for people getting fed right now,” Trump said next to Starmer ahead of their meeting at Trump Turnberry in Scotland.

“That’s the number one position, you have a lot of starving people,” he added.

“The United States recently, just a couple of weeks ago, we gave $60 million. It’s a lot of money. No other nation gave money.”

Starmer recently announced plans to airdrop aid to Gaza and had joined dozens of Western nations in raising concerns about the dire conditions on the ground in the war-torn enclave.

During his meeting with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Sunday, Trump complained that the US wasn’t getting a “thank you” for the humanitarian aid it marshaled for Gaza and claimed he took political heat for giving the aid.

Over the weekend, the Israeli military began allowing airdrops of aid to fall into Gaza. Israel’s military also announced plans to establish critical humanitarian corridors for United Nations convoys to enter and disperse aid to starving Palestinians in Gaza.

The Israeli Defense Force characterized its shift as being “aimed at improving the humanitarian response” in Gaza and to “refute the false claims of deliberate starvation in the Gaza Strip.”

Over 250 trucks filled with aid from the UN and other groups entered Gaza on Saturday, which is lower than the roughly 600 trucks per day that entered during the previous ceasefire that fell apart in March.