US envoy says a truce in Lebanon is 'within our grasp' as Gaza's food crisis worsens after looting

BEIRUT -- A United States envoy said an agreement to end the Israel-Hezbollah war is “within our grasp” after talks in Lebanon on Tuesday. There was no such optimism in the Gaza Strip, where the looting of nearly 100 aid trucks by armed men worsened an already severe food crisis.

Amos Hochstein, the Biden administration’s pointman on Israel and Lebanon, arrived as Hezbollah’s allies in the Lebanese government said it had responded positively to the proposal, which would entail both the militants and Israeli ground forces withdrawing from a U.N. buffer zone in southern Lebanon.

The buffer zone would be policed by thousands of additional U.N. peacekeepers and Lebanese troops. Israel has called for a stronger enforcement mechanism, potentially including the ability to operate against any Hezbollah threats, something Lebanon is likely to oppose.

Hochstein said he held “very constructive talks” with Lebanon’s Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, an ally of Hezbollah who is mediating on the group’s behalf.

“Specifically today, we have continued to significantly narrow the gaps,” he told reporters after the two-hour meeting. “It’s ultimately the decisions of the parties to reach a conclusion to this conflict. ... It is now within our grasp.”

In Gaza, meanwhile, the theft of nearly 100 trucks loaded with food and other humanitarian aid over the weekend sent prices soaring and caused shortages in central Gaza, where most of the population of 2.3 million people have fled and where hundreds of thousands are crammed into squalid tent camps.

Experts say famine may already have set in in the north, where Israel has been waging a weekslong offensive that has killed hundreds of people and driven tens of thousands from their homes.

Food prices soar in central Gaza after looting

On Monday, a crowd of people waited outside a shuttered bakery in the central city of Deir al-Balah. A woman who had been displaced from Gaza City, identifying herself as Umm Shadi, said the price of flour had climbed to 400 shekels (over $100) a bag, if it can even be found.

Nora Muhanna, another woman displaced from Gaza City, said she was leaving empty-handed after waiting five hours for a bag of bread for her children. “From the beginning, there are no goods, and even if they are available, there is no money,” she said.

The United Nations said armed men stole food and other aid from 98 trucks over the weekend, the largest single incident of its kind since the start of the war. It did not say who was behind the theft.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the convoy of 109 trucks was instructed by the Israeli military to take an “alternative, unfamiliar route” after the aid was brought through the Kerem Shalom crossing, and that the trucks were robbed near the crossing itself.

Israel has long accused criminal gangs and Hamas of stealing aid, allegations denied by the militant group.

Al-Aqsa TV, a media outlet operated by the militants, said Hamas-run security forces in Gaza had launched an operation against looters, killing 20 of them.

Bassem Naim, a senior Hamas official based abroad, said the looters were young men from Bedouin tribes in the area, emphasizing that they do not necessarily represent the tribes. He said they operate east of Rafah near Israeli military positions.

The Hamas-run government had a police force of tens of thousands that maintained a high degree of public security before the war, but they have vanished from the streets in many areas after being targeted by Israeli strikes. Hamas says it has taken measures to prevent both looting and price-gouging in local markets.

But the biggest problem is not theft – it’s the low amount of aid Israel allows into Gaza, said Tamara Alrifai, communications director for UNRWA, the U.N. agency with the biggest role in the aid operation.

“Take aid into a war zone a few trucks at a time, what do we expect a displaced, hungry and traumatized population to do?” she said of the theft.

The flow of aid is at nearly the lowest level of the entire 13-month war. So far this month, Israel says it let into Gaza an average of 88 trucks a day – less than half the highest rate of the war, in April, which aid groups say was still too low.

From the aid that does enter, UNRWA says only about half actually reaches Palestinians because Israeli military restrictions and fears of theft often prevent the agency from collecting truck cargos at the border.

Israel says it puts no restrictions on the quantity of aid entering Gaza and that it is working to increase the amount. This month, it opened a new crossing into central Gaza. So far it has reported a few dozen trucks entering through it.

Wars rage on in Biden administration’s final months

Hamas ignited the war in Gaza when its fighters stormed into Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250. Around 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed over 43,800 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to local health authorities, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants in their toll. The war has left much of the territory in ruins and forced around 90% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million to flee, often multiple times.

Hezbollah began firing rockets into northern Israel the day after the Hamas attack in what it said was solidarity with the Palestinians and Hamas, a fellow Iran-backed militant group. Israel launched retaliatory airstrikes, and all-out war erupted in September.

Israeli bombardment has killed more than 3,500 people in Lebanon and wounded almost 15,000, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. It also displaced nearly 1.2 million, or a quarter of Lebanon’s population. On the Israeli side, 87 soldiers and 50 civilians have been killed by rockets, drones and missiles.

The Biden administration has spent several months trying to broker cease-fires on both fronts. It appears to have made some progress in Lebanon, while talks over a cease-fire and the release of hostages held in Gaza stalled over the summer.

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to end the wars in the Middle East without saying how he would do it. He was a staunch supporter of Israel and its hawkish government during his first term.

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Shurafa reported from Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip and Khaled from Cairo.

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Find more of AP’s coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war