Rishi Sunak on Tuesday urged Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza as a top UN official warned of “apocalyptic” conditions in the enclave.
In a call between the two leaders, the Prime Minister told his Israeli counterpart that civilians in Gaza were in “desperate need” of aid as the IDF ramped up its military campaign in the south.
The US has pressured Israel to prevent further mass casualties after thousands of civilian deaths so far in the conflict, sparked by a brutal Hamas attack on Israel on October 7.
A Downing Street spokesperson said Mr Sunak expressed his “disappointment” about the resumption of fighting in Gaza following the end of an agreed ceasefire.
“The Prime Minister offered an update on his engagement with leaders in the Middle East and reiterated his public remarks in the region last week, stressing the need for Israel to take greater care to protect civilians in Gaza and focus narrowly on military targets.”
He told Mr Netanyahu that the UK was ready to offer support to facilitate “deliveries of life-saving aid” at Israel’s request.
Mr Sunak and Mr Netanyahu also discussed “urgent efforts” to ensure all remaining hostages taken by Hamas are safely freed from Gaza and to ensure that remaining British nationals in Gaza are able to evacuate.
The British PM also “welcomed commitments to address extremist settler violence and intimidation, which was destabilising the situation in the West Bank”.
Israel on Tuesday said that its troops - who were backed by warplanes - had reached the heart of Khan Younis and were also surrounding the city.
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“We are in the most intense day since the beginning of the ground operation,” the commander of the Israeli military's Southern Command, General Yaron Finkelman, said in a statement.
Martin Griffiths, the UN emergency relief coordinator, told the Guardian that the war had created an “apocalyptic situation” in the south of the country.
“The way in which the military operation in the south has been carried out is very similar to what we saw in the north,” he said.
“US diplomacy was very much focused on this and [secretary of state] Tony Blinken spoke about it publicly. It does not seem to have worked at all, and so the pace of destruction in the south is as relentless as we see in the north.”
