ANKARA

US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee linked the starvation in the Gaza Strip to Hamas’ control and suggested weight-loss drug Ozempic instead of food.

In an interview with British journalist Piers Morgan, Huckabee on Monday claimed the Palestinian group opposed the US and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation because its methods of delivering food "has really hurt their capacity to control the food market."

"They don't care about people getting to eat. They care that they eat," the US envoy said. "None of them are hungry. I guarantee you. Look at their faces, look at their bodies ... instead of food they could use some Ozempic," he added, referring to the diabetic drug that has been linked to weight loss.

While Huckabee did not provide evidence for his claims, multiple observers, local authorities, and rights groups, including the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, have accused Israeli forces of providing military cover for armed groups in Gaza that loot and resell aid on the black market.

UN experts last week called for the immediate dismantling of the GHF, warning that its operations are deepening the suffering of Palestinians and undermining international humanitarian law.

The experts said Palestinians are "paying the ultimate price of the international community’s legal, political and moral failure" as the death toll in Gaza surpasses 60,000, with more than 90% of the population forcibly displaced.

The GHF, established by Israel in February with the backing of the US, was set up to distribute aid in Gaza. But UN experts have described it as "an utterly disturbing example of how humanitarian relief can be exploited for covert military and geopolitical agendas in serious breach of international law."

Medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) on Monday again criticized the GHF, describing aid sites run by the US and Israeli-backed group in the Palestinian territory as scenes of "orchestrated killing."

"This is not aid. This is orchestrated killing," the organization known by its French acronym MSF said on American social media company X.

The charity urged immediate action, calling for the GHF to be dismantled, for states to stop funding it, for the UN-led coordination system to be restored, and for the siege on Gaza to be lifted to allow safe, large-scale aid delivery

Since the GHF began operating in late May, Israeli forces and foreign military contractors are said to have opened fire on people seeking aid at its distribution sites. Since then, nearly 1,400 people have been killed and more than 4,000 injured while attempting to access food, including at least 859 fatalities around GHF facilities, according to the UN.​​​​​​​