Closing summary
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.
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.
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.
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 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’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.
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.
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 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”.
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.
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.
Denmark will send a Hercules military plane to airdrop aid to Gaza, Danish foreign minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen told reporters on Tuesday.
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
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.
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
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.
