Foreign ministers of 25 countries issue joint statement calling for “flood” of aid to be let in to Gaza
The foreign ministers of 25 countries including the UK, Australia, France, Spain and Japan as well as two signatories from the EU have released a joint statement saying that “humanitarian suffering in Gaza has reached unimaginable levels” and calling for the government of Israel to let in aid shipments and allow essential humanitarian actors to operate in Gaza.
The statement in full:
The humanitarian suffering in Gaza has reached unimaginable levels. Famine is unfolding before our eyes. Urgent action is needed now to halt and reverse starvation. Humanitarian space must be protected, and aid should never be politicised.
However, due to restrictive new registration requirements, essential international NGOs may be forced to leave the OPTs imminently which would worsen the humanitarian situation still further. We call on the government of Israel to provide authorisation for all international NGO aid shipments and to unblock essential humanitarian actors from operating. Immediate, permanent and concrete steps must be taken to facilitate safe, large-scale access for the UN, international NGOs and humanitarian partners. All crossings and routes must be used to allow a flood of aid into Gaza, including food, nutrition supplies, shelter, fuel, clean water, medicine and medical equipment. Lethal force must not be used at distribution sites, and civilians, humanitarians and medical workers must be protected.
We are grateful to the US, Qatar and Egypt for their efforts in pushing for a ceasefire and pursuing peace. We need a ceasefire that can end the war, for hostages to be released and aid to enter Gaza by land unhindered.
The signatories: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Japan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK. The EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission, the EU Commissioner for the Mediterranean and the EU Commissioner for Equality, Preparedness and Crisis Management.
Key events
Closing summary
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The foreign ministers of 25 countries including the UK, Australia, France, Spain and Japan as well as two signatories from the EU have released a joint statement saying that “humanitarian suffering in Gaza has reached unimaginable levels” and calling for the government of Israel to let in aid shipments and allow essential humanitarian actors to operate in Gaza.
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Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid has backed calls for a general strike in solidarity with hostages still held in Gaza, AFP reports. “Strike on Sunday,” Lapid posted on X, saying even supporters of the current government should take part and insisting it was not party political.
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Iranian police arrested as many as 21,000 “suspects” during the country’s 12-day war with Israel in June, Reuters reports, citing state media.
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Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli air strikes on Gaza City have intensified in recent days, following prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet approving plans to expand the war there, AFP reports.
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The World Health Organization said Israel should let it stock medical supplies to deal with a “catastrophic” health situation in Gaza, before it seizes control of Gaza City, AFP reports.
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Israel’s defence minister has reprimanded the country’s military chief over appointments made without his approval, as tensions simmered between the military and the executive ahead of a planned expansion of the war in Gaza.
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The Council of Europe urged its member states on Tuesday to halt deliveries of weapons to Israel if they could be used for human rights violations. Michael O’Flaherty, the Council’s commissioner for human rights, said member states should do “their utmost to prevent and address violations of international human rights” in the conflict.
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Gaza’s Hamas-run government media office has said Israel is blocking the entry of more than 430 food items into the territory, despite allowing some aid trucks through last month under international pressure.
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The Elders group of international stateswomen and statesmen for the first time on Tuesday called the situation in Gaza an “unfolding genocide”, saying that Israel’s obstruction of aid was causing a “famine”.
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At least 89 Palestinians, 31 seeking aid, have been killed and 513 injured in Israeli attacks across Gaza in the past 24 hours, according to the territory’s health ministry.
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France added to the voices condemning Israel’s strikes on journalists in Gaza and called on the Israeli authorities to guarantee “safe and unhindered access” for international media, AFP reports.
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Denmark will send a Hercules military plane to airdrop aid to Gaza, Danish foreign minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen told reporters on Tuesday.
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Norway’s $2tn sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, has said it expects to divest from more Israeli companies as part of its ongoing review of investments in the country over the situation in Gaza and the West Bank, Reuters reports
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A Hamas delegation is holding talks with Egyptian officials in Cairo to repair their relationship after it deteriorated last week, Egyptian and Palestinian sources told Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
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Australia prime minister Anthony Albanese said his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu was “in denial” about the humanitarian situation in Gaza, a day after announcing Australia would recognise a Palestinian state for the first time, Reuters reports.
Israel intensifies bombing of Gaza killing 89 within 24 hours
Lorenzo Tondo
Israel has stepped up bombing Gaza, killing at least 89 Palestinians in 24 hours, including at least 15 people queueing for food, despite global outcry over the deaths of six journalists in the territory the previous day.
Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli air strikes on Gaza City had intensified in the three days after Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet approved plans to expand the war in the territory.
Five more people, including two children, were reported to have died of starvation, as the foreign ministers of 24 countries including the UK, Australia, France, Spain and Japan warned that “humanitarian suffering in Gaza has reached unimaginable levels”. The ministers and the EU foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, called on the government of Israel to let in aid shipments immediately and allow essential humanitarian actors to operate in Gaza. “Urgent action is needed now to halt and reverse starvation,” they said.
More than 15 people were killed while waiting for food distribution at the Zikim crossing in northern Gaza, said Fares Awad, head of the ambulance services in northern Gaza.
In the south of the territory, five people including a couple and their child, were killed by an Israeli airstrike on a house in the city of Khan Younis and four by a strike on a tent encampment in nearby Mawasi, medics said.
Iran could hold direct nuclear talks with the United States if conditions are suitable, first vice-president Mohammadreza Aref said on Tuesday, according to state media.
But he said US demands for Tehran to drop uranium enrichment entirely were “a joke”.
A sixth round of talks between Tehran and Washington was suspended following Israeli and US strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities in June.
Both powers accuse Iran of seeking nuclear weapons, an accusation Tehran has rejected.
A Palestinian man carries food items collected from aid packages dropped from an aeroplane, amid the hunger crisis, in Deir Al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip, earlier today.
Denmark will send a Hercules military plane to airdrop aid to Gaza, Danish foreign minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen told reporters on Tuesday.
Palestinian children carry jerrycans after collecting water from a distribution point in Gaza City today.
France added to the voices condemning Israel’s strikes on journalists in Gaza and called on the Israeli authorities to guarantee “safe and unhindered access” for international media, AFP reports.
On Sunday, five Al Jazeera journalists were killed in an Israeli strike on their tent in Gaza City. A freelance reporter was also killed in the strike.
Condemning the strike, the French foreign ministry said that the journalists were targeted while “carrying out their reporting duties”.
“Journalists must never be targeted,” Pascal Confavreux, a spokesman for the French foreign ministry, said in a statement, adding that they were protected by international humanitarian law.
International journalists “must be able to operate freely and independently to document the reality of the conflict,” he added.
Foreign ministers of 25 countries issue joint statement calling for “flood” of aid to be let in to Gaza
The foreign ministers of 25 countries including the UK, Australia, France, Spain and Japan as well as two signatories from the EU have released a joint statement saying that “humanitarian suffering in Gaza has reached unimaginable levels” and calling for the government of Israel to let in aid shipments and allow essential humanitarian actors to operate in Gaza.
The statement in full:
The humanitarian suffering in Gaza has reached unimaginable levels. Famine is unfolding before our eyes. Urgent action is needed now to halt and reverse starvation. Humanitarian space must be protected, and aid should never be politicised.
However, due to restrictive new registration requirements, essential international NGOs may be forced to leave the OPTs imminently which would worsen the humanitarian situation still further. We call on the government of Israel to provide authorisation for all international NGO aid shipments and to unblock essential humanitarian actors from operating. Immediate, permanent and concrete steps must be taken to facilitate safe, large-scale access for the UN, international NGOs and humanitarian partners. All crossings and routes must be used to allow a flood of aid into Gaza, including food, nutrition supplies, shelter, fuel, clean water, medicine and medical equipment. Lethal force must not be used at distribution sites, and civilians, humanitarians and medical workers must be protected.
We are grateful to the US, Qatar and Egypt for their efforts in pushing for a ceasefire and pursuing peace. We need a ceasefire that can end the war, for hostages to be released and aid to enter Gaza by land unhindered.
The signatories: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Japan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK. The EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission, the EU Commissioner for the Mediterranean and the EU Commissioner for Equality, Preparedness and Crisis Management.
Gaza’s Hamas-run government media office has said Israel is blocking the entry of more than 430 food items into the territory, despite allowing some aid trucks through last month under international pressure.
The office said banned items include “frozen meat of all kinds, frozen fish, cheese, dairy products, frozen vegetables, and fruits”, along with “hundreds of other items needed by the starving and sick”.
The statement said the partial easing announced on July 27 has not lifted broad restrictions on food and other essential goods.
The statement added that Israel had directly targeted food sources, by not just preventing aid, but deliberately bombing 44 food banks, killing dozens of workers in them, and targeting “57 food distribution centers with bombardment”.
The Guardian could not independtly verify these claims. Earlier today Cogat, the Israeli MoD organisation tasked with facilitating logistics in Gaza said: “300 trucks carrying humanitarian goods entered Gaza through the Kerem Shalom and Zikim crossings, and over 270 trucks were collected and distributed by the UN and international organisations. Additionally, tankers of UN fuel entered for the operation of essential humanitarian systems.”
Iranian police arrested as many as 21,000 “suspects” during the country’s 12-day war with Israel in June, Reuters reports, citing state media.
Following Israeli air strikes that began on 13 June, Iranian security forces began a campaign of widespread arrests accompanied by an intensified street presence based around checkpoints and “public reports” whereby citizens were called upon to report on any individuals they thought were acting suspiciously.
“There was a 41% increase in calls by the public, which led to the arrest of 21,000 suspects during the 12-day war,” police spokesperson Saeid Montazerolmahdi said.
He did not say what those arrested were suspected of, but Tehran has spoken before of people passing on information that may have helped direct the Israeli attacks. The Israel-Iran conflict has also led to an accelerated rate of deportations for Afghan migrants believed to be illegally in Iran, with aid agencies reporting that local authorities had also accused some Afghan nationals of spying for Israel.
“Law enforcement rounded up 2,774 illegal migrants and discovered 30 special security cases by examining their phones. 261 suspects of espionage and 172 people accused of unauthorised filming were also arrested,” the spokesperson added.
Montazerolmahdi did not specify how many of those arrested had since been released.
Israel’s defence minister in fresh row with military chief
Israel’s defence minister has reprimanded the country’s military chief over appointments made without his approval, as tensions simmered between the military and the executive ahead of a planned expansion of the war in Gaza.
Agence France-Presse reports that Israel Katz’s defence ministry said in a statement on Tuesday that deliberations conducted by chief of staff Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir on military appointments “took place… without prior coordination or agreement” with the minister.
The statement added that this was “in violation of accepted procedure” and that Katz therefore “does not intend to discuss or approve any of the appointments or names that were published.”
In an army statement published shortly afterwards, Zamir responded that he was “the sole authority authorised to appoint officers from the rank of colonel upwards”.
“The chief of staff makes the appointment decisions – after which the appointment is brought to the minister for approval,” the statement added.
Tensions have been simmering for two weeks between the chief of staff and Benjamin Netanyahu’s government over the next steps in the military operation in Gaza, aimed at freeing the remaining hostages and defeating Hamas.
Israeli media reported that Zamir was opposed to a plan approved by the security cabinet on Friday to take control of all of Gaza City, instead favouring encircling it.
The Council of Europe urged its member states on Tuesday to halt deliveries of weapons to Israel if they could be used for human rights violations.
Michael O’Flaherty, the Council’s commissioner for human rights, said member states should do “their utmost to prevent and address violations of international human rights” in the conflict.
“This includes applying existing legal standards to ensure that arms transfers are not authorised where there is a risk that they may be used to commit human rights violations,” he said, in a statement.
It was also “essential to intensify efforts to provide relief to those affected by the conflict, by supporting efforts to ensure unhindered access for humanitarian assistance and by pressing for the immediate release of hostages,” O’Flaherty said.
The call by the Council – a human rights organisation representing 46 states – comes shortly after Germany said it would halt delivery to Israel of some weapons that could be used in Gaza as part of Israeli plans to take control of Gaza City.
O’Flaherty said the Council had taken note of this and other government initiatives, and also of contributions by some national human rights structures in raising awareness.
“However, more needs to be done, and quickly,” he said.
The Elders group of international stateswomen and statesmen for the first time on Tuesday called the situation in Gaza an “unfolding genocide”, saying that Israel’s obstruction of aid was causing a “famine”.
“Today we express our shock and outrage at Israel’s deliberate obstruction of the entry of life-saving humanitarian aid into Gaza,” the non-governmental group of public figures, founded by former South Africa president Nelson Mandela in 2007, said in a statement after delegates visited border crossings in Egypt.
“What we saw and heard underlines our personal conviction that there is not only an unfolding, human-caused famine in Gaza. There is an unfolding genocide.”
Helen Clark, former prime minister of New Zealand, called on Israel to open the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza so aid could be delivered, after visiting the site.
“Many new mothers are unable to feed themselves or their newborn babies adequately, and the health system is collapsing,” she said. “All of this threatens the very survival of an entire generation.”
Clark was joined by Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland and former UN high commissioner for human rights, on the visit.
She said that international leaders “have the power and the legal obligation to apply measures to pressure this Israeli government to end its atrocity crimes”.
WHO asks for more medical aid to be allowed into Gaza before Israeli offensive
The World Health Organization said Israel should let it stock medical supplies to deal with a “catastrophic” health situation in Gaza, before it seizes control of Gaza City, AFP reports.
Israel has said its military would “take control” of Gaza City in a plan approved by prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet that sparked a wave of global criticism.
“We want to stock up, and we all hear about more humanitarian supplies are allowed in – well it’s not happening yet, or it’s happening at a way too low a pace,” said Rik Peeperkorn, WHO’s representative in the Palestinian territories.
52% of medicines were running at zero stock, Peeperkorn said, speaking from Jerusalem.
Peeperkorn said the WHO was able to bring in fewer supplies than it wanted “due to the cumbersome procedures” and products “still denied” entry – a topic of constant negotiation with the Israeli authorities.
“We want to as quickly stock up hospitals … following the news – the whole discussion about an incursion in Gaza,” he said. “We currently cannot do that … We need to be able to get all essential medicines and medical supplies in.”
Peeperkorn said only 50% of hospitals and 38% of primary health care centres were functioning, and even then partially. Bed occupancy has reached 240% capacity in the Al-Shifa hospital and 300% at Al-Ahli Hospital in northern Gaza.
“The overall health situation remains catastrophic,” he said. “Hunger and malnutrition continue to ravage Gaza”.
At least 89 Palestinians, 31 seeking aid, have been killed and 513 injured in Israeli attacks across Gaza in the past 24 hours, according to the territory’s health ministry.
Eleven bodies were also recovered from the rubble of previous Israeli attacks, the ministry statement said on the Telegram messaging app. Israel’s war on Gaza has killed a total of 61,599 Palestinians and injured 154,088 since October 7, 2023, the ministry added.
Israeli opposition leader backs calls for general strike in solidarity with hostages still held in Gaza
Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid has backed calls for a general strike in solidarity with hostages still held in Gaza, AFP reports.
“Strike on Sunday,” Lapid posted on X, saying even supporters of the current government should take part and insisting it was not party political.
“Strike out of solidarity. Strike because the families have asked, and that’s reason enough. Strike because no one has a monopoly on emotion, on mutual responsibility, on Jewish values.”
Sunday is the first day of the working week in Israel.
Lapid’s post followed a call on Sunday by around 20 parents of hostages still held by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip for a strike.
On Monday, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the main representative group for relatives, backed the idea.
Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli air strikes on Gaza City have intensified in recent days, following prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet approving plans to expand the war there, AFP reports.
The Israeli government has not provided an exact timetable on when its forces would enter the area, but according to the civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal, air strikes on Gaza City have been increasing for the past three days.
Bassal said the residential neighbourhoods of Zeitoun and Sabra have been hit “with very heavy airstrikes targeting civilian homes, possibly including high-rise buildings”.
“For the third consecutive day, the Israeli occupation is intensifying its bombardment,” said the spokesman.
“The Israeli occupation is using all types of weapons in that area – bombs, drones, and also highly explosive munitions that cause massive destruction to civilian homes,” he added.
Bassal said that at least 24 people had been killed across Gaza on Tuesday, including several casualties caused by strikes on Gaza City.
“The bombardment has been extremely intense for the past two days. With every strike, the ground shakes. There are martyrs under the rubble that no one can reach because the shelling hasn’t stopped,” said Majed al-Hosary, a resident in Zeitoun.
AFP provides some analysis on what Israel’s military can expect to face in its new offensive on Gaza City:
In a dense urban landscape, with likely thousands of Hamas fighters lying in wait, taking Gaza City will be a difficult and costly slog for the Israeli army, security experts say.
On Sunday, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu laid out his vision of victory in Gaza following 22 months of war – with the military ordered to attack the last remaining Hamas strongholds in Gaza City and the central camps further south.
Amir Avivi, a former Israeli general and head of the Israeli Defense and Security Forum think tank, described the city as the “heart of Hamas’s rule in Gaza”.
“Gaza City has always been the centre of government and also has the strongest brigade of Hamas,” he said.
According to Michael Milshtein, who heads the Palestinian Studies Program at Tel Aviv University, Hamas’s military wing could have as many as 10,000 to 15,000 fighters in Gaza City, many of them freshly recruited.
“It’s very easy to convince a 17, 18, 19-year-old Palestinian to be a part of Al-Qassam Brigades,” Milshtein told AFP.
Other obstacles could include improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and the use of civilians as human shields in a dense urban maze of narrow alleys and tall buildings, according to press reports.
“It’s almost impossible to go in there without creating both hostage casualties and a large humanitarian disaster,” said Mairav Zonszein of the International Crisis Group. “They will simply destroy everything, and then nothing will be left,” she said.
Israel continues strikes on Gaza City
Israeli planes and tanks kept bombarding eastern areas of Gaza City overnight, killing at least 11 people, witnesses and medics said, Reuters reports.
Witnesses and medics said the Israeli military pounded eastern districts of Gaza City again overnight, killing seven people in two houses in the Zeitoun suburb and four in an apartment building in the city centre.
In the south of the territory, five people including a couple and their child were killed by an Israeli airstrike on a house in the city of Khan Younis and four by a strike on a tent encampment in nearby Mawasi, medics said.
The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports and that its forces take precautions to mitigate civilian harm. Separately, it said that its forces had killed dozens of militants in north Gaza over the past month and destroyed more tunnels used by militants in the area.
