Palestinians in Gaza are ‘enduring a humanitarian catastrophe of epic proportions’, UN secretary general says
A trickle of aid into the Gaza Strip must become an ocean, the UN secretary-general António Guterres said, adding that the IPC famine alert “confirms what we have feared”, that Gaza is on the brink of famine.
“The facts are in – and they are undeniable,” he said in a statement.
“Palestinians in Gaza are enduring a humanitarian catastrophe of epic proportions. This is not a warning. It is a reality unfolding before our eyes.”
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Updated at 15.58 BST
Key events
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1h ago
UK plans to recognise Palestinian state in September unless Israel meets conditions, Starmer says
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2h ago
Palestinians in Gaza are ‘enduring a humanitarian catastrophe of epic proportions’, UN secretary general says
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4h ago
Gaza needs to be flooded with ‘large-scale food aid’ now to prevent mass starvation, World Food Programme says
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5h ago
France will airdrop aid into Gaza ‘in coming days’, says diplomatic source
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6h ago
Death toll from Israeli attacks on Gaza surpasses 60,000, says health ministry
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6h ago
‘Crumbs of aid won’t prevent human death at an unimaginable scale’, Oxfam warns
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7h ago
Palestinian who helped make Oscar-winning No Other Land killed in West Bank
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7h ago
Situation in Gaza unlike anything this century, says UN’s World Food Programme
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8h ago
What is the technical definition of famine?
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8h ago
Trump acknowledges ‘real starvation’ in Gaza and tells Israel to let in ‘every ounce of food’
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8h ago
Famine now unfolding in Gaza, UN-backed monitor says
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9h ago
Using airdrops to deliver aid is ‘futile initiative that smacks of cynicism’, MSF says
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The UK and Jordan have air-dropped 20 tonnes of aid to Gaza in recent days, David Lammy has said.
“We have to have those trucks get in,” the foreign secretary told reporters in New York. “And our assessment is that 25 trucks went in, I think on Sunday, perhaps up to 35.
“Just in this last period, we have delivered 20 tonnes of aid with our Jordanian friends into northern Gaza in terms of air drops to alleviate the suffering and obviously to ensure that those air drops landed safely in a clear path.
“But that will not ease the suffering that we are seeing, the malnourishment that now is widespread, and the fear of starvation that is a global concern.
“And so the United Kingdom working with partners, and you’ve seen us working with our Arab partners, but obviously working alongside France and Saudi Arabia today, we are all attempting to bring an end to this suffering.”
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David Lammy, the UK’s foreign secretary, is speaking to reporters at the UN in New York.
Asked if Keir Starmer gave President Trump warning of this announcement, Lammy said he would not comment on private discussions.
But he said the UK has “the most special of relationships with the United States”.
ShareAndrew Sparrow
David Lammy, the British foreign secretary, is speaking now at the UN conference on a two-state solution for the Middle East.
He says “the two-state solution is in peril”. He says Arthur Balfour, a previous British foreign secretary, signed the declaration that paved the way for the foundation of Israel. The UK is proud of that.
But the declaration also said nothing would be done that would prejudice the rights of Palestinians, he says. That has not been upheld, he says.
He says the UN has passed many resolutions calling for a two-state solution. He recites the numbers of those resolutions, and says they cannot just be numbers on a page.
Hamas cannot be rewarded for the 7 October attack, he says.
But Hamas are not the Palestinian people and there is no contradiction between support for Israel’s security and support for Palestinian statehood.
Indeed, the opposite is true.
Lammy goes on:
The Netanyahu government’s rejection of a two-state solution is wrong. It’s wrong morally and it’s wrong strategically. It harms the interests of the Israeli people, closing off the only path to a just and lasting peace, and that is why we are determined to protect the viability of a two-state solution.
And so it is with the hand of history on our shoulders that His Majesty’s government therefore intends to recognise the state of Palestine when the UN general assembly gathers in September here.
Lammy says it is the government’s intention to recognise the state of Palestine when the UN general assembly meets in September. He gets a round of applause – before he has mentioned the conditions.
Once the applause has died down, Lammy cites the conditions mentioned by Starmer.
We will do this unless the Israeli government acts to end the appalling situation in Gaza, ends its military campaign and commits to a long sustainable peace based on a two-state solution.
Our demands on Hamas also remain absolute and unwavering.
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Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday that Israel was continuing its efforts to release hostages being held by Hamas in Gaza, despite the “refusal” of Hamas.
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UK plans to recognise Palestinian state in September unless Israel meets conditions, Starmer says
Britain will recognise the state of Palestine in September unless the Israeli government takes substantive steps to end the “appalling situation” in Gaza and meets other conditions, British prime minister Keir Starmer told cabinet on Tuesday according to a government statement.
“He said that the UK will recognise the state of Palestine in September, before UNGA (United Nations General Assembly), unless the Israeli government takes substantive steps to end the appalling situation in Gaza, reaches a ceasefire, makes clear there will be no annexation in the West Bank, and commits to a long-term peace process that delivers a Two State Solution,” the statement said.
“He reiterated that there is no equivalence between Israel and Hamas and that our demands on Hamas remain, that they must release all the hostages, sign up to a ceasefire, accept that they will play no role in the government of Gaza, and disarm.”
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Updated at 16.53 BST
Donald Trump and Keir Starmer will have “failed humanity” if they do not act to stop the famine in Gaza, Oxfam has said.
An spokesperson for the charity described the escalating crisis as a “humanitarian catastrophe” and added that “urgent, forceful diplomacy” is required.
They said:
President Trump and prime minister Starmer will fail humanity if they do not act. For the first time, the IPC, the UN-backed monitor, has said famine is now unfolding in Gaza. This is no longer about alarm bells.
This is the acknowledgement of a humanitarian catastrophe. With president Trump still on British soil and the UK cabinet holding an emergency meeting today they no longer have time for equivocation or semantics. We must see an end to the genocide, opened borders, and the secure the release of hostages and detainees on both sides.
Airdrops and brief pauses for meagre deliveries of aid are nowhere near enough to prevent starvation and death on the scale the world is now witnessing. Only urgent, forceful diplomacy will achieve an immediate and unconditional ceasefire, break Israel’s siege, and allow lifesaving aid to flow freely and safely.
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Updated at 16.42 BST
Palestinians in Gaza are ‘enduring a humanitarian catastrophe of epic proportions’, UN secretary general says
A trickle of aid into the Gaza Strip must become an ocean, the UN secretary-general António Guterres said, adding that the IPC famine alert “confirms what we have feared”, that Gaza is on the brink of famine.
“The facts are in – and they are undeniable,” he said in a statement.
“Palestinians in Gaza are enduring a humanitarian catastrophe of epic proportions. This is not a warning. It is a reality unfolding before our eyes.”
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Updated at 15.58 BST
Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa), has reacted to the IPC famine alert.
In a post on X, he said the famine is “entirely man-made”, adding that the only way to “reverse this catastrophe is to flood Gaza with a massive scale up of aid”.
“The United Nations including Unrwa have the expertise & resources available,” Lazzarini wrote. “Unrwa alone has the equivalent of 6,000 trucks of food & medicine ready to cross into Gaza. Let us do our work without restrictions, in safety & dignity,” he added.
Unrwa has been the major distributor of aid in Gaza and has provided education, health and other basic services to millions of Palestinian refugees across the region.
But an Israeli ban on the agency in Gaza and the occupied West Bank took effect earlier this year after Israel accused it of being infiltrated by Hamas, the Palestinian militant group. Unrwa denies this claim.
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Updated at 15.39 BST
Here are some of the latest images that have been sent over the newswires from Gaza:
A Palestinian man walks near the rubble of houses destroyed during an Israeli raid in the central Gaza Strip. Photograph: Hatem Khaled/ReutersIsraeli soldiers drive on their armored personnel carrier back from inside the northern Gaza Strip into southern Israel. Photograph: Ariel Schalit/APPalestinian people mourn the loss of their loved ones. Photograph: APAImages/ShutterstockMourners pray during the funeral of Palestinian people killed in an early morning Israeli airstrike on a house, according to medics, at al-Awda hospital. Photograph: Hatem Khaled/ReutersShare
The Guardian’s chief Middle East correspondent, Emma Graham-Harrison, has some more detail from the UN backed food security body’s report that said earlier that the “worst-case scenario of famine” is now unfolding in Gaza (see post at 09.22 for more details).
Here is an extract from her story about the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report:
The IPC report details how Israel’s “drastic restrictions” on the entry of food has limited shipments to far below the levels needed to cover basic needs in Gaza, without fresh foods such as vegetables and meat.
The population needs an estimated 62,000 metric tonnes of food staples each month. Israeli data shows no food entered Gaza in March or April, 19,900 tonnes entered in May and 37,800 tonnes entered in June, the IPC report says.
“This is unlike anything we have seen in this century,” said the WFP emergency director, Ross Smith, addressing reporters in Geneva via video link from Rome.
“It reminds us of previous disasters in Ethiopia or Biafra in the past century. We need urgent action now.”
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Gaza needs to be flooded with ‘large-scale food aid’ now to prevent mass starvation, World Food Programme says
Cindy McCain, the executive director of the World Food Programme, has said vast quantities of aid urgently needs to be allowed into Gaza at a much greater volume to “prevent mass starvation”.
McCain said:
The unbearable suffering of the people of Gaza is already clear for the world to see. Waiting for official confirmation of famine to provide life-saving food aid they desperately need is unconscionable.
We need to flood Gaza with large-scale food aid, immediately and without obstruction, and keep it flowing each and every day to prevent mass starvation.
People are already dying of malnutrition and the longer we wait to act, the higher the death toll will rise.
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German chancellor Friedrich Merz said that two of the country’s aircraft could fly aid airdrop missions from Jordan to Gaza as soon as Wednesday, calling the help a small but important signal.
“This work may only make a small contribution to humanitarian aid, but it sends an important signal: We are here, we are in the region,” said Merz at a press conference alongside Jordan’s King Abdullah in Berlin.
Two A400M aircraft were on their way to Jordan at the moment, where they would refuel and then fly their aid mission at the weekend at the latest, in coordination with France and Germany, said Merz.
Merz also welcomed initial steps taken by Israel to allow in aid but said more must follow.
ShareLisa O’Carroll
The European Commission has proposed partially suspending Israel from its flagship £80bn Horizon science research programme over what officials called a “severe” humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
It comes amid worldwide condemnation of Israel’s actions in Gaza including demands by Donald Trump that it must do more to stop the “real starvation”. On Tuesday, the leading international authority on food crises, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, said the “worst-case scenario of famine is currently playing out” in Gaza.
Horizon Europe is among the most prestigious science research programmes in the world and has never suspended a country before. Officials believe, however, the humanitarian crisis in Gaza is so severe that it now has a legal basis for suspension.
In its proposal to member states the commission reports that “90% of households face severe water insecurity and malnutrition rates are rising sharply” with “severe shortages of medicine” and “virtually the entire Gaza population … at risk of famine”.
Israel has denied that it is the cause of starvation, blaming it on other factors including the looting of aid by Hamas and distribution failures by the UN.
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France will airdrop aid into Gaza ‘in coming days’, says diplomatic source
France will airdrop aid into Gaza “in coming days”, a diplomatic source has told the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency.
“France will carry out airdrops in the coming days to meet the most essential and urgent needs of the civilian population in Gaza,” the source said as they urged for “an immediate opening by Israel of the land crossing points”.
Spain said yesterday that it would airdrop 12 tonnes of food into Gaza this week, in what will be another rare example of a European nation joining Middle Eastern countries (like Jordan and the UAE) in sending aid into the territory by air.
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Updated at 12.42 BST
The UK’s prime minister, Keir Starmer, is set to hold an emergency cabinet meeting on Gaza this afternoon.
The Labour government is under intense domestic pressure to take further action on Israel as UK public opinion hardens and pressure mounts on Starmer to at least (immediately) recognise Palestinian statehoood.
UK government sources have said that formal recognition of Palestinian statehood was a matter of “when, not if”. You can follow the latest developments in our UK politics live blog.
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Updated at 14.38 BST
Death toll from Israeli attacks on Gaza surpasses 60,000, says health ministry
At least 60,034 Palestinian people have been killed and 145,870 others injured in Israeli attacks on Gaza since 7 October 2023, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.
At least 113 Palestinian people were killed and 637 others injured in the last 24 hours alone, the ministry said, despite the Israeli military pause in parts of the Gaza Strip.
Gaza’s health ministry added in its Telegram post:
A number of victims are still under the rubble and on the streets, as ambulance and civil defense crews are unable to reach them until now.
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‘Crumbs of aid won’t prevent human death at an unimaginable scale’, Oxfam warns
Oxfam has said the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Initiative statement must “finally rouse the international community to act with a clarity and resolve that has so far been beyond it”.
Oxfam’s policy lead in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Bushra Khalidi, said:
Israel’s genocide has thrown Gaza into the final chaotic stages of a full-blown human catastrophe. Today’s warning of an unfolding famine – one created entirely by Israel’s murderous siege – must finally rouse the international community to act with a clarity and resolve that has so far been beyond it.
World leaders have been variously divided, complicit, uncaring, and collectively ineffectual in stopping Israel’s campaign of erasure. In failing to protect the Palestinian people, they have no more excuses left. Ending Israel’s genocide of Gaza is a test not only of our world order but of our collective humanity.
Air drops, and brief pauses for relative crumbs of aid, is nowhere near enough to prevent human death at an unimaginable scale. We need urgent forceful diplomacy and whatever restrictive measures are necessary in order to achieve an immediate and unconditional ceasefire, break Israel’s siege and allow humanitarian aid to flow freely and safely throughout Gaza. The hostages and unlawfully detained prisoners must be released.
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My colleagues William Christou and Malak A Tantesh have written a useful explainer looking at how Israel’s ‘humanitarian pauses’ will affect Gaza’s starvation crisis caused by Israel’s restrictions on aid. Here is an extract from it:
Israel has announced airdropped aid will resume, which humanitarian organisations have said will provide a negligible amount of supplies. It also said that humanitarian corridors would be established to facilitate the entry of UN aid trucks into Gaza, though the number of trucks that will be allowed in was not specified.
NGOs say these steps may ease aid access, but with mass starvation already under way, far more is needed. In particular, humanitarian groups have called for a full ceasefire in order to get civilians the help they need.
“We have to go back to the levels we had during the ceasefire, 500-600 trucks of aid every day managed by the UN, including Unrwa, that our teams would distribute in 400 distribution points,” said Juliette Touma, the Unrwa director of communications.
She explained that aid agencies had previously walked Gaza back from the brink of starvation and that to do so again, an unimpeded flow of aid would be needed to “reverse the tide and trajectory of famine”.
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Updated at 11.41 BST
Palestinian who helped make Oscar-winning No Other Land killed in West Bank
William Christou
Awdah Hathaleen, a Palestinian activist and journalist who helped make the Oscar-winning documentary No Other Land, has been killed during an attack by Israeli settlers in the south Hebron hills.
The attack on Monday was captured on video, which appears to show an Israeli settler, Yinon Levi, who was put under sanctions by the US president, Joe Biden, then removed from the sanctions list by Donald Trump, firing his gun wildly at the time of the killing.
He was arrested later by Israeli police for questioning, though no charges have been filed against him.
Footage shows Israeli settler firing gun during attack on Palestinians – video
The killing comes amid an increasing wave of settler and Israeli military violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. At least 1,009 Palestinians have been killed and more than 7,000 injured in the West Bank since October 2023.
Accountability for settlers who commit acts of violence against Palestinians is rare.
According to activists from the village of Umm al-Khair in the West Bank, where the shooting took place, the killing happened after a settler in a bulldozer drove through their land, destroying trees and property.
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