US President Donald Trump is “frustrated” by the ongoing war in Gaza, feels it is the last issue preventing prosperity in the Middle East and wants the Israeli government to “wrap it up,” according to a Tuesday report citing White House officials.
According to the report, published on the Axios news site, over the past two weeks, Trump pressured Israel to open crossings for humanitarian aid after assistance had been blocked since March.
The report quoted a White House official as saying Trump was “upset” by images of suffering Palestinian children and babies in the Strip due to the blockade and Israeli strikes, and that he “pressed the Israelis to reopen the gates.”
Israel allowed just five aid trucks to enter Gaza on Monday, the first time any aid had entered the enclave in over 11 weeks, after international pressure mounted on Jerusalem to alleviate the worsening hunger crisis and after some officials in the IDF warned the political leadership that Gaza was on the brink of starvation.
Aid was blocked from Gaza since March 1, with Israel arguing that sufficient humanitarian assistance entered the Strip during a six-week ceasefire and that Hamas has been stealing much of that aid, with the blockade necessary to pressure the terror group to release dozens of hostages it is holding.
On Tuesday, the UN said that Israel had given clearance to bring an additional 100 trucks into Gaza, though UN officials said that the level of crisis necessitated tjhe entry of far more aid, and that it needed to happen quickly.
“The president is frustrated about what is happening in Gaza. He wants the war to end, he wants the hostages to come home, he wants aid to go in and he wants to start rebuilding Gaza,” a White House official said, according to the report.
“The president sees a real chance for peace and prosperity in the region, but the war in Gaza is the last hot spot and he wants it to end,” the official added.
A second official told Axios that “there is a lot of frustration by this crisis getting dragged on,” adding that the backchannel deal to release US-Israeli hostage soldier Edan Alexander last week developed from that feeling.
However, an Israeli official told the site that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu doesn’t feel pressured on the matter by Trump.
“If the president wants a hostage and ceasefire deal in Gaza he needs to put much more pressure on both sides,” the official said.
The White House stressed Monday that Trump wants the war in Gaza to end, though American officials denied reports that Washington was threatening to “abandon” Israel if it didn’t follow suit.
“The president is moving as quickly as he possibly can and working overtime to end these conflicts in both Israel and Gaza and also the Russia-Ukraine war,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt added. “The president made it very clear to Hamas that he wanted to see all hostages released.”
The war in Gaza began when Hamas led the October 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel, which killed some 1,200 people and saw 251 hostages taken back to the Strip.
Fifty-eight hostages remain in captivity, of whom at least 35 are dead, according to Israeli assessments.
More than 53,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the war, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry. That toll includes hundreds of Gazans killed in strikes since Israel initiated a fresh intensive operation on Friday.
The toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters.