President Trump is pressuring Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to allow more aid to enter the Gaza Strip. International organisations and many governments believe the Palestinian territory is on the verge of a humanitarian catastrophe amid widespread food shortages.

Meeting with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Monday, Trump lamented what he described as “real starvation” in Gaza. Stating that Israel had “a lot of responsibility” for the crisis, he added that Israel should ensure “every ounce of food” entered Gaza. Vice President JD Vance has similarly observed that “You have got some really, really heartbreaking cases. You’ve got little kids who are clearly starving to death. Israel’s got to do more to let that aid in.”

This rhetoric and a phone call between Trump and Netanyahu explain why Israel has now authorised a few new aid routes into Gaza. Still, with his coalition government increasingly unstable and reliant on hardline elements that are vigorously opposed to allowing aid into Gaza, Netanyahu’s amenability to boost aid remains uncertain. Indeed, Israeli media reports that the government is now contemplating a siege of Gaza to pressure Hamas. The question is whether Trump will accept this siege or only slightly increase aid supplies?

Unlikely. Trump has regularly been moved to action by images of civilian suffering. That was the case in 2017 when he authorised air strikes in response to a Syrian regime chemical weapons attack. The US President frequently references the high death toll in the Russia-Ukraine war as a motive for his peace agenda there. And Trump has bemoaned the agony of former Israeli hostages of Hamas.

The basic point is that Trump doesn’t buy Israel’s excuse that its aid efforts are simply being frustrated by the UN’s incompetence and Hamas’s theft of aid. While those Israeli concerns may be at least somewhat legitimate, Trump and Vance’s rhetoric strongly suggests that US intelligence has briefed them on Gaza’s increasingly critical situation and Israeli role in exacerbating it.

What we’re likely to see, then, are demands from Trump for Israel to provide more approvals and support for UN-led aid convoys into different areas of Gaza. Israel’s reluctance to support these convoys with approvals and security has led to aid sitting at storage depots, unable to be delivered where it is needed. The US is also likely to push Israel to allow the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation to set up new food delivery depots in areas closer to population centres (existing depots have been too far away from many Gazans to make a difference). Always with an eye for theatrics, Trump may also authorise US aid drops into Gaza alongside other nations that have done so in recent days. Aid convoys are only part of the picture here, however.

Trump recognises that the situation in Gaza undermines his prized effort to boost US relations with its Sunni Arab allies, and advance his Abraham Accords peace process between those states and Israel. US allies across the world are also telling Trump that he is the only person who can resolve this situation. In turn, it is hard to see Trump accepting piecemeal Israeli aid allowances, a renewed siege of Gaza, or a return to the high-intensity airstrikes that marked the early phase of the war. Those strategies would lead to significant new civilian casualties and, via the association of being Israel’s closest ally, new damage to America’s diplomatic standing and global reputation.

While Trump has rightly placed blame on Hamas for the collapse of the most recent round of ceasefire talks, he also says that Netanyahu may need a different strategy in Gaza. It’s likely that Trump now increases pressure on Qatar to get Hamas back to a concessionary negotiating table, and simultaneously increases pressure on Netanyahu to boost aid allowances for Gaza alongside targeted ground force military operations.

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Tom Rogan is a national security writer at the Washington Examiner

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