Netanyahu says Hamas taking control of humanitarian aid in Gaza

By Lazar Berman

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26 June 2025, 12:15 am

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Lazar Berman is The Times of Israel's diplomatic reporter

Palestinians carry sacks and boxes of food and humanitarian aid unloaded from a World Food Program convoy that had been heading to Gaza City, in the northern Gaza Strip, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)

Hamas is taking control of humanitarian aid entering the northern Gaza Strip and stealing it from Gazan civilians, says Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz in a joint late-night statement.

They instruct the IDF to present to them within 48 hours a plan to keep Hamas from stealing aid, according to the statement.

The announcement comes an hour after former prime minister Naftali Bennett, who looks to be a leading challenger to Netanyahu in the next election, posted on X a video of armed men he says are Hamas operatives riding on trucks full of humanitarian aid that they had taken over. He wrote that soldiers in the ground told him their orders are to let trucks in to Gaza with no attempt to control what happens to them.