Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said on Tuesday that America “has a moral responsibility” to make sure that children in Gaza are being fed.
Speaking at a press conference in Lancaster, Pa., the Jewish Democrat cited problems with providing food aid to Gaza, whose residents the United Nations and many other Israel critics say are facing starvation, as the war between Hamas and Israel rages on.
“The fact that kids are starving in Gaza is not OK,” the governor said. “It is true that Hamas intercepts aid. It is true that the aid distribution network is not as sophisticated as it needs to be.”
“But given that, I think our nation, the United States of America, has a moral responsibility to flood the zone with aid and make sure those children that need to be fed get the food and the nourishment and the medicines that they need to be able to survive this,” he said.
Shapiro called on the United States “to dramatically increase the aid that we send to the Middle East, to Gaza specifically, to be able to provide a plan for the safe distribution of it.”
Shapiro said that since U.S. President Donald Trump decided to negotiate directly with Hamas and “broke that norm of not negotiating with terrorists,” then he “damn well better be on the phone with Hamas trying to figure out how to get aid in there to the starving people, and not have Hamas intercept it.” (Shortly after the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, John Bolton, a former U.S. national security advisor, was one of many to decry U.S. President Joe Biden insisting that Israel negotiate with the Hamas terror group.)
The Pennsylvania governor acknowledged that Hamas continues to hold about 50 hostages, whom it kidnapped on Oct. 7.
“They need to return the hostages immediately,” he said. “I think it is fair to say that I’m both praying for the return of the hostages and praying to make sure that these kids get fed in Gaza.”
At the press conference, Shapiro had harsh words for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and said it was “quite abhorrent” for the Israeli premier to say there was no starvation in Gaza.
Netanyahu said in a July 27 speech in Jerusalem with Paula White, a pastor and leader of the White House Faith Office, that, “There is no policy of starvation in Gaza, and there is no starvation in Gaza. We enable humanitarian aid throughout the duration of the war to enter Gaza. Otherwise, there would be no Gazans.”
“As a result of that type of language, as a result of standing with Donald Trump with plans to occupy Gaza, or, as President Trump said, ‘drive all the Palestinians out and create’—his words, not mine—‘a Riviera of the Middle East,’ or however the president said it, I think that is not only reckless language,” Shapiro said.
“What it does is it further isolates Israel in the world, and that’s a dangerous place for Israel to be,” the governor said. “The rhetoric coming from Prime Minister Netanyahu only creates less stability and security for Israel, who is a critical ally of the United States, whose democracy is important that it be present and flourish in the Middle East.”
He stated that “for the prime minister to not acknowledge the hunger and starvation is just wrong.”
