UK to formally sanction Israeli ministers over war in Gaza – Middle East crisis live | Israel

Patrick Wintour

More than 300 Foreign Office staff have been told to consider resigning after they wrote a letter over fears the government had become complicit in Israel’s alleged war crimes in Gaza.

It is the fourth internal letter from staff about the offensive in Gaza, which started in October 2023 in response to Hamas’s deadly attack on Israel.

In their letter of 16 May the staff, from embassies around the world and at various levels of seniority, questioned the UK’s continued arms sales and what they called Israel’s “stark … disregard for international law”.

Foreign Secretary David Lammy has elaborated on the UK government’s decision to impose sanctions on two Israeli ministers.

“We are sanctioning the two ministers who have used horrendous extremist language,” Lammy said, adding that he would “encourage the Israeli government to disavow and condemn that language”.

Asked whether the UK would encourage Mr Netanyahu to sack the ministers, Lammy said: “The Israeli government will make their own determination.”But from the UK’s perspective, he said: “We have to be clear that we act when we see these egregious individuals encouraging abuses of human rights in this way.”

After UK sanctions on two Israeli ministers, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu says there has been “significant progress” in hostage talks.

“It’s too early to raise hopes,” he said in a video statement, “but we are working tirelessly right now, and all the time. I hope we will be able to move forward.”

Pressure is mounting on Israel to reach a ceasefire and allow humanitarian aid into Gaza after nearly two years of fighting.

54 hostages remain in Gaza, of whom about 31 are thought to be dead. As the war rages on, the chance of their continuing survival diminishes.

Dr Einat Yahana, a psychologist with the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, says that more than 38% of family members of hostages suffer from extreme fatigue, anxiety, difficulty sleeping, and depression.

Meanwhile, over 50,000 Palestinians have perished in Gaza since the war began after the 7 October attacks.

Foreign minister Gideon Sa’ar said: “There has recently been certain progress. In light of past experience, I don’t want to overstate it at this point.

“But we are interested in reaching a deal, which will include a ceasefire.”

Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu will convene his cabinet on Thursday to discuss hostage talks, The Times of Israel reports.

Israeli officials describe “tentative progress” in talks with Hamas over a hostage release/ceasefire deal.

Hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists taking part in a convoy crossed the Tunisian border on Tuesday into Libya, aiming to keep heading eastwards until they break Israel’s blockade on the Palestinian territory, the AFP reports.

The “Soumoud” convoy, meaning “steadfastness” in Arabic, embarked from Tunis on Monday morning. The convoy includes 14 buses and 100 other vehicles, carrying hundreds of people.

Convoy members were heard chanting “Resistance, resistance” and “To Gaza we go by the millions” in a video posted on the organising group’s official Facebook page. Henchiri also told Jawhara FM radio channel the convoy plans to remain in Libya for “three or four days at most” before crossing into Egypt and continuing on to Rafah.

Organisers have said Egyptian authorities have not yet provided passage to enter the country, but Henchiri said the convoy received “reassuring” information. Organisers said the convoy was not bringing aid into Gaza, but rather aimed at carrying out a “symbolic act” by breaking the blockade on the territory described by the United Nations as “the hungriest place on Earth”.

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola said the war in Gaza hurt his “whole body” when accepting an honorary doctorate from the University of Manchester on Monday.

Snippets from the City boss’s speech have been circulating on social media.

“Let me be clear, it’s not about ideology. It’s not about whether I’m right, or you’re wrong. It’s just about the love of life, about the care of your neighbour.

“Maybe we think that we see the boys and girls of four years old being killed by the bomb or being killed at the hospital because it’s not a hospital anymore. It’s not our business.

“We can think about that. It’s not our business. But be careful. The next one will be ours. The next four- or five-year-old kids will be ours. Sorry, but I see my kids, Maria, Marius and Valentina. When I see every morning since the nightmare started the infants in Gaza, and I’m so scared.”

Swedish activist Greta Thunberg accused Israel of “kidnapping us in international waters and taking us against out will to Israel” after security forces intercepted a boat carrying humanitarian aid bound for Gaza.

“This is yet another intentional violation of rights that is added to the list of countless other violations that Israel is committing,” Thunberg, 22, told reporters on arrival at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris after being deported from Israel, stressing that her own experience was “nothing compared to what the Palestinians are going through”.

Israel’s far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has expressed defiance to the UK government’s decision to impose sanctions on him and finance minister Bezalel Smotrich.

In a statement, Ben-Gvir said: “We survived Pharaoh, we will also survive Keir Starmer. I will continue to work for Israel and the people of Israel without fear or intimidation!”

He went on to compare the UK’s decision to the 1939 UK policy paper limiting Jewish immigration to Mandatory Palestine.

Smotrich also calls the decision “a white paper”.

“Britain has already tried once to prevent us from settling the cradle of our homeland, and we will not allow it to do so again,” he continues. “We are determined to continue building.”

The British government will formally sanction two far-right Israeli ministers, Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, following their conduct over the war in Gaza, the Times reported on Tuesday.

The UK will join Canada, Australia, New Zealand and other nations in freezing the assets and imposing travel bans on Israel’s national security minister Ben-Gvir – a West Bank settler – and finance minister Smotrich.

Last month, the government suspended free trade talks with Israel for pursuing “egregious policies” in the illegally occupied West Bank and Gaza, summoned its ambassador, and announced further sanctions against West Bank settlers.

UK foreign minister David Lammy, who called Israel’s recent offensive “a dark new phase in this conflict,” has previously condemned comments by Smotrich on the possible cleansing and destruction of Gaza and relocation of its residents to neighbouring countries.

In the Commons, Lammy accused Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu of “planning to drive Gazans from their homes into a corner of the Strip to the south and permit them a fraction of the aid that they need”.

“Minister Smotrich even spoke of Israeli forces ‘cleansing’ Gaza, ‘destroying what’s left,’ of resident Palestinians ‘being relocated to third countries,’” Lammy said. “We must call this what it is. It is extremism. It is dangerous. It is repellent. It is monstrous. And I condemn it in the strongest possible terms.”

Reacting to the sanctions, Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs Gideon Sa’ar said the decision to sanction its ministers was “outrageous,” adding that he would discuss the matter with Netanyahu next week to “decide on our response to this unacceptable decision.”

Emma Graham-Harrison

We’ve been reporting on the worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and my colleague Emma Graham-Harrison, reporting from Jerusalem, writes that Israeli troops killed at least 17 Palestinians trying to reach food distribution sites on Tuesday morning.

The GHF did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The Israeli military said it was aware of reports of injuries after it fired warning shots towards “suspects” in the Wadi Gaza area whom its troops deemed a threat. “The warning shots were fired hundreds of meters from the aid distribution site, prior to its opening hours,” a spokesperson said. The military said the numbers released by local health authorities did not align with the information they had collected.

Read more of Emma’s excellent reporting here…

Here are some images coming to us over the wires:

The United States and Israel are seeking to turn nuclear talks into a “strategic trap” for Iran, Iranian lawmakers said in a statement on Tuesday, days before a planned sixth round of Iran-US nuclear talks.

“The US is not serious in negotiations at all. It has set the goal of talks as imposing its demands and has adopted offensive positions that are diametrically opposed to Iranians’ inalienable rights,” the statement from parliamentarians said.

US President Donald Trump highlighted on Monday that the two sides remained at odds on the issue of uranium enrichment in Iran, which Iranian lawmakers say is a non-negotiable part of the country’s nuclear programme.

While Trump said the next round of talks would take place on Thursday, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson said it was planned to take place on Sunday in Oman.

Iran is to share a counterproposal to a US offer for a nuclear deal, which it says is not acceptable considering its position on enrichment and lack of detail on the lifting of sanctions, Reuters reports.

“The only acceptable deal is one that permanently lifts all sanctions with the aim of achieving economic benefits for Iran,” lawmakers added in their statement.

Good afternoon,

Here’s a summary of today’s stories developing in Gaza and around the Middle East.

• Israel have deported Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg after she was detained along with other activists aboard a Gaza-bound aid boat. “Greta Thunberg is departing Israel on a flight to France,” Israel’s foreign ministry said on its official X account.

• Trump should summon Netanyahu to the White House and, facing cameras, tell the Israeli leader: “‘Bibi: enough is enough’”, Ehud Olmert, Israel’s prime minister between 2006 and 2009, tells AFP. “This is it. I hope he [Trump] will do it. There is nothing that cannot happen with Trump. I don’t know if this will happen. We have to hope and we have to encourage him.”

• Sport in Gaza on the brink of collapse says VP of Palestinian Olympic committee. Asaad al-Majdalawi, vice president of the Palestinian Olympic Committee, tells Al Jazeera that Gaza’s entire sporting infrastructure is on the brink of collapse. “Every major component of Gaza’s sports system has been hit,” al-Majdalawi told Al Jazeera. “The Olympic Committee offices, sports federations, clubs, school and university sports programmes – even private sports facilities have been targeted. It’s a comprehensive assault.”

• The president of the European parliament has been in “constant contact” with Israeli authorities over the MEP Rima Hassan, who was detained after naval forces intercepted an aid ship bound for Gaza. Hassan, a French MEP of Palestinian origin, who belongs to the radical left France Unbowed party, was on board the Madleen, which was carrying a symbolic amount of food and aid for Gaza, when it was intercepted by Israeli forces.

• An independent United Nations commission says Israel’s attacks in Gaza amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity. “Israel has obliterated Gaza’s education system and destroyed over half of all religious and cultural sites in the Gaza Strip — part of a widespread and relentless assault against the Palestinian people in which Israeli forces have committed war crimes and the crime against humanity of extermination.”

On Tuesday the US defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, wrote on X that US navy ships had travelled through the Red Sea and its Bab el-Mandeb strait “multiple times in recent days” without facing Houthi attacks.

“These transits occurred without challenge and demonstrate the success of both Operation ROUGH RIDER and the President’s Peace Through Strength agenda,” Hegseth wrote ahead of facing Congress for the first time since sharing sensitive military details of America’s military campaign against the Houthis in a Signal chat.

It is unclear how the Houthis will respond now that an attack has come from the sea, rather than the air, from the Israelis.

Meanwhile, a wider, decade-long war in Yemen between the Houthis and the country’s exiled government, backed by a Saudi-led coalition, remains in a stalemate.