LONDON: British Prime Minister Keir Starmer told Israel’s President Isaac Herzog there needed to be “immediate steps” toward a ceasefire in Israel’s conflict with Hamas militants in Gaza.
“The Prime Minister said there must be immediate steps toward a ceasefire, so that hostages can be released and more humanitarian aid can get in for those in desperate need,” Starmer’s office said in a statement released on Sunday.
“The Prime Minister reiterated his ongoing support for Israel’s right to self-defense in accordance with international law,” the statement said.
Starmer met Herzog in Paris where both were attending the Olympics.
In a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on July 7 shortly after Starmer took office, he “set out the clear and urgent need for a ceasefire,” according to a previous British government statement.
Starmer on Sunday said there was no moral equivalence between Israel and Hamas and expressed his condolences for the deaths of five hostages kidnapped during the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7 whose bodies had recently been recovered.
About 1,200 people were killed and 250 were taken hostage in the Oct. 7 attack, according to Israeli tallies.
More than 39,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli offensive in Gaza, according to local health authorities, who do not distinguish between fighters and non-combatants.
‘Immediate steps’ needed toward Gaza ceasefire, UK’s Starmer tells Israel’s President Herzog
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‘Immediate steps’ needed toward Gaza ceasefire, UK’s Starmer tells Israel’s President Herzog
- Starmer met Herzog in Paris where both were attending the Olympic Games
US lawmakers press Israel to probe strike on reporters in Lebanon
- “The IDF has made no effort, none, to seriously investigate this incident,” Welch said
- Collins called for Washington to publicly acknowledge the attack in which an American citizen was injured
WASHINGTON: Several Democratic lawmakers called Thursday for the Israeli and US governments to fully investigate a deadly 2023 attack by the Israeli military on journalists in southern Lebanon.
The October 13, 2023 airstrike killed Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and wounded six other reporters, including two from AFP — video journalist Dylan Collins and photographer Christina Assi, who lost her leg.
“We expect the Israeli government to conduct an investigation that meets the international standards and to hold accountable those people who did this,” Senator Peter Welch told a news conference, with Collins by his side.
The lawmaker from Collins’s home state of Vermont said he had been pushing for answers for two years, first from the administration of Democratic president Joe Biden and now from the Republican White House of Donald Trump.
The Israeli government has “stonewalled at every single turn,” Welch added.
“With the Israeli government, we have been extremely patient, and we have done everything we reasonably can to obtain answers and accountability,” he said.
“The IDF has made no effort, none, to seriously investigate this incident,” Welch said, referring to the Israeli military, adding that it has told his office its investigation into the incident is closed.
Collins called for Washington to publicly acknowledge the attack in which an American citizen was injured.
“But I’d also like them to put pressure on their greatest ally in the Middle East, the Israeli government, to bring the perpetrators to account,” he said, echoing the lawmakers who called the attack a “war crime.”
“We’re not letting it go,” Vermont congresswoman Becca Balint said. “It doesn’t matter how long they stonewall us.”
AFP conducted an independent investigation which concluded that two Israeli 120mm tank shells were fired from the Jordeikh area in Israel.
The findings were corroborated by other international probes, including investigations conducted by Reuters, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders.
Unlike Welch’s assertion Thursday that the Israeli probe was over, the IDF told AFP in October that “findings regarding the event have not yet been concluded.”
