ISTANBUL

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman held talks in Doha on Sunday with UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Martin Griffiths to discuss ways of facilitating the entry of humanitarian aid into the besieged Gaza Strip.

The talks dwelt on ways to bolster regional and international efforts to reach an immediate cease-fire in Gaza and to facilitate an obstacle-free humanitarian aid access to Gaza, the state news agency QNA reported.

Bin Abdulrahman, who is also a foreign minister, underlined the importance of the UN role in supporting efforts “to battle the worsening humanitarian catastrophe and put an end to the suffering of the Palestinian brothers trapped in the Gaza Strip.”

Qatar, along with Egypt and the US, is mediating between Israel and Hamas to reach an agreement on a Gaza truce and hostage-prisoner swap.

Hamas, which is believed to be holding nearly 130 Israeli hostages, demands an end to Israel’s ongoing offensive on the Gaza Strip in return for any hostage deal with Israel.

Israel has waged a deadly military offensive on the Gaza Strip since an Oct. 7 cross-border attack led by Hamas in which some 1,200 people were killed.

More than 32,200 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have since been killed in Gaza, and over 74,500 others injured amid mass destruction and shortages of necessities.

Israel has also imposed a crippling blockade on the Gaza Strip, leaving its population, particularly residents of northern Gaza, on the verge of starvation.

The Israeli war has pushed 85% of Gaza’s population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice. An interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

*Writing by Ikram Kouachi