Famine risk in Gaza very high, especially in north, US official says

Israel has taken significant steps in recent weeks on allowing aid into Gaza, the U.S. special envoy for humanitarian issues said on Tuesday, but considerable work remained to be done as the risk of famine in the enclave is very high.

David Satterfield declined to say whether Washington was satisfied by Israel's moves, weeks after U.S. President Joe Biden demanded action to alleviate the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, saying conditions could be placed on U.S. support for close ally Israel if it did not implement a series of "specific, concrete and measurable" steps.

"Israel has taken significant steps in these last two and a half weeks," Satterfield told reporters. "There is still considerable work to be done. But progress has been made."

The risk of famine throughout war-devastated Gaza, especially in the north, is "very high", he said, calling for more to be done to get aid to those in need in that part of the tiny, densely populated Palestinian territory.

The United Nations has long complained of obstacles to getting aid in and distributing it throughout Gaza in the six months since Israel began an aerial and ground offensive against Gaza's ruling Islamist militant group Hamas.

Israel's military campaign has reduced much of the territory of 2.3 million people to a wasteland with an unfolding humanitarian disaster since October, when Hamas ignited war by storming into southern Israel.