UK working on plans to air drop aid into Gaza, PM tells Macron and Merz
In a readout of the call, Number 10 said the leaders had agreed 'it would be vital to ensure robust plans are in place to turn an urgently-needed ceasefire into lasting peace'.
'The Prime Minister set out how the UK will also be taking forward plans to work with partners such as Jordan to air drop aid and evacuate children requiring medical assistance,' a Downing Street spokesperson said.
However, the head of the UN's Palestinian refugee agency warned airdrops were 'a distraction and screensmoke' that would fail to reverse deepening starvation in Gaza, and could in some cases harm civilians.
UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini said on Saturday: 'A man-made hunger can only be addressed by political will. Lift the siege, open the gates and guarantee safe movements and dignified access to people in need.'
Israel said on Friday it will allow airdrops of aid by foreign countries into Gaza to alleviate suffering in the Palestinian territory, where there is widespread devastation.
The readout made no mention of the issue of Palestinian statehood, which the Prime Minister has faced calls to immediately recognise after French President Mr Macron confirmed his country would do so in September.
However, Downing Street said the leaders had committed to 'work closely together on a plan' to 'pave the way to a long-term solution and security in the region'.
Once the proposals have been 'worked up', they will seek to advance them with other key partners, including in the region, the readout said.
Some 221 MPs from Labour, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats, SNP, Greens, Plaid Cymru, SDLP and independents have signed a letter pressuring the Government to follow suit at a UN meeting next week.
Donald Trump suggested Mr Macron's announcement, which saw him commit to formally recognising Palestinian sovereignty at the UN General Assembly in September, 'doesn't matter' as he left the US for a visit to Scotland.
Sarah Champion, the senior Labour MP who organised the letter by parliamentarians, said recognition 'would send a powerful symbolic message that we support the rights of the Palestinian people'.
Other senior Commons figures who signed the letter include Labour select committee chairs Liam Byrne, Dame Emily Thornberry and Ruth Cadbury.
Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey, as well as Tory former minister Kit Malthouse, and Sir Edward Leigh – Parliament's longest-serving MP – also signed it.
The majority of those who have signed, 131, are Labour MPs.
The Government has so far said its immediate focus is on getting aid into the territory and insisted that recognising sovereignty must be done as part of a peace process.
Charities operating in Gaza have said Israel's blockade and ongoing military offensive are pushing people there towards starvation, warning that they are seeing their own workers and Palestinians 'waste away'.
But Mr Lazzarini said airdrops can be dangerous as they can fall on civilians, and that being able to drive aid through is more effective and safer.
'Airdrops will not reverse the deepening starvation. They are expensive, inefficient and can even kill starving civilians,' he said. 'It is a distraction and screensmoke.'
The Prime Minister will meet the US president during his trip to Scotland, where he arrived on Friday evening.
US-led peace talks in Qatar were cut short on Thursday, with Washington's special envoy Steve Witkoff accusing Hamas of a 'lack of desire to reach a ceasefire'.
The deal under discussion is expected to include a 60-day ceasefire in which Hamas would release 10 living hostages and the remains of 18 others in phases in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.
Aid supplies would be ramped up and the two sides would hold negotiations on a lasting truce.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy's opposite number Dame Priti Patel said she had 'repeatedly pressed' him on 'what specific and deliverable solutions he is trying to advance on aid'.
'The British Government needs to be leveraging its influence and the UK's considerable aid expertise to bring about practical solutions that alleviate the dire and deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza,' she said.
'The priority must be to get as much aid in as possible, delivered safely and exclusively to innocent civilians.
'Diplomacy is about finding solutions, not just issuing condemnations.'
Meanwhile, Israel's ambassador to the UK said recognising Palestinian statehood would 'reward' hostage-taking and killing by Hamas.
'Recognising a Palestinian state in a post-October 7 reality would be nothing less than a reward for terrorism,' she wrote in the Telegraph.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Spectator
15 minutes ago
- Spectator
Why France is cracking down on topless tourists
Police have been sent out to patrol France's seaside promenades. Not to chase hardened criminals – but to look for bare-chested tourists. From Les Sables-d'Olonne to Cassis, and in a growing number of coastal towns, local authorities are introducing by-laws banning shirtless men from wandering around in public. The fines are €150 if you're caught walking from the beach to the bakery in swim shorts and flip-flops, but no shirt. Uniformed gendarmes have been instructed to enforce the rules. Posters have gone up at beaches. Police are stopping tourists, handing out tickets and giving lectures. The summer's great threat to republican order, it seems, is the male torso. 'We are not nudists' declared Yannick Moreau, the mayor of Les Sables-d'Olonne, defending the new rules he's implemented as a matter of 'respect' and 'civic-mindedness'. In Cassis, on the Mediterranean coast, the town hall says the aim of the new measures is to 'preserve the elegance of the town'. Even the slogans are sanctimonious – 'Du sable à la ville, on se rhabille', that's 'when going from the beach to the town, we get dressed again.' One mayor, asked if the policy might be seen as heavy-handed, replied simply 'we're not asking people to wear a suit and tie, just a T-shirt'. There's something oddly comforting about it all if it were not for the bigger picture. The French state, for all its troubles, can still mobilise gendarmes to patrol the promenade, hand out fines and preserve a certain idea of public decency. Shirtless tourists, at least, the authorities know how to handle. But when it comes to the country's real problems with violent crime and insecurity, gang warfare, and lawless enclaves, the state increasingly looks powerless. The front page of yesterday's Journal du Dimanche showed a blood-red map of France, marking dozens of towns now gripped by a violence which was once thought to be limited to the banlieues of large towns and cities. Knife attacks, shootings, cars set alight, gang reprisals, even mortar fire. In Béziers, Blagnac, Albi, Lunel, Cavaillon, Metz, the gendarmes are not chasing bare-chested tourists, they're dodging bullets. Police in the small town of Carpentras in the Vaucluse won't go at all into certain housing estates without significant reinforcements. In Béziers, mayor Robert Ménard says his town is experiencing a wave of gangland violence. 'Eighty per cent of the troublemakers,' he told the Journal du Dimanche, 'come from immigration'. In Tarn, the body of a 22-year-old was found after what police believe was a drug-related execution. In Limoges, teenagers are barricading streets and launching attacks on emergency services. In Clermont-Ferrand, officers responding to a noise complaint were ambushed with iron bars. In Pontarlier, grenade blasts and gunfire now rattle quiet residential streets. These are far from isolated incidents. According to Ofast, France's anti-drug agency, the spread of organised crime into provincial towns is now 'deeply entrenched.' Cocaine is no longer a big city vice. It's a national industry. In response, some towns have tried imposing curfews. Others have begged for more police or tighter sentencing. What they often get is silence or lectures about the 'complex roots' of delinquency. Meanwhile, in places like Les Sables-d'Olonne, the authorities continue to defend the €150 fine for not wearing a shirt. The contrast is telling. The state can still act when it wants to. It can deploy uniformed officers to enforce swimwear etiquette. It can issue municipal by-laws about torsos and flip-flops. But faced with criminal networks, urban warfare and a judiciary that barely functions, it hesitates, defers or looks away. It's easier to fine a tourist without a shirt than to deal with drug traffickers on a housing estate. It's human nature to follow the path of least resistance. Policing beachwear is entirely risk-free. The new measures in seaside towns play well with local voters nostalgic for order. There is no national scandal, no debate in the Assemblée Nationale, no risk of accusations of stigmatising anyone, and no complaints from the hard left. It's public order in symbolic form alone: controlled and deeply unserious. But the deeper problem isn't symbolic. It's structural. Robert Ménard has asked to further arm Béziers' municipal police dealing with increasingly violent heavily armed gangs. The state said no. Local prosecutors complain they lack the tools to put violent offenders behind bars. The interior minister announces new plans every few months, but sentences are rarely served in full. There isn't enough space in prisons, not enough police, and not enough will to confront what everyone now sees. The France that worked, quietly, efficiently, locally, is faltering. It has become a theatre of control. You can see it clearly in the small and medium-sized towns that were once the last bastion of republican order. These were places where the state still worked. Where people trusted the police, the mayor, the courts. That's now all slipping away. In town after town, people no longer feel safe. France still knows how to police the small stuff. It can stop a man buying a baguette without a shirt. It can fine him on the spot, with a polite smile and a printed receipt. But when it comes to the real collapse, of order, of confidence, of the state's ability to impose the law where it truly matters, the state shrugs, retreats, or launches yet another working group.
Scotsman
16 minutes ago
- Scotsman
Investors need certainty to build the homes Scotland needs
We must unlock the investment that would deliver new housing, says Colin Brown Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... In May 2024, the Scottish Parliament declared a national 'housing emergency' with some councils also declaring a housing emergency in their areas. The announcement of the emergency came two months after the Scottish Government laid the Housing (Scotland) Bill before the Scottish Parliament. The Bill continues to work its way through Holyrood and is expected to come into force later this year. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Observers in the world of institutional investment and those working in the sector have been watching the progress of the Bill with interest. Of particular concern to investors are proposals around rent controls. Colin Brown is a Partner at TLT To give one example that has occurred recently – a London-based investment firm, was about to commit many millions of pounds to its first Scottish investment before discovering that a committee considering the Bill had voted to include purpose-built student accommodation as subject to statutory rent controls. All of the financial appraisals the firm had undertaken in making the decision to invest in Scotland were potentially being ripped up by MSPs and they had no power to do anything about this. In this situation, the Scottish Government moved quickly to make clear it would not support rent control for purpose-built student accommodation. Whilst the project is now starting to come out of the ground it remains to be seen whether they consider Scotland a safe haven for future investment. The rental income which institutional investors derive from their investments in bricks and mortar helps to fund many individuals' pensions. The investors need to understand that in exchange for making their money available they will get a return on their investment and this return has generally been left to market forces – the law of supply and demand. The housing emergency should make investment in new build housing in Scotland a win-win. The country gets much-needed new housing to alleviate the emergency, and the investment funds get to deploy their capital to deliver housing and make a return on their investment. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad In the UK in the first quarter of this year £1.2 billion was invested in private rental accommodation with the potential for £6bn to be invested by the end of the year. 76 per cent of this investment is being directed outside London, with Manchester, Birmingham, and Leeds leading the way. Every penny of this investment creates new housing and sustains and creates job opportunities. The fact that Scotland has not been able to open the investment tap when cities in England are seeing private rental accommodation expand, could be seen as a missed opportunity. In launching the latest consultation, the Social Justice Secretary acknowledges that rental properties are a crucial element of the efforts to tackle the housing emergency. Government policy has slowed investment into the sector in recent years and resulted in lower investor confidence in providing much-needed housing. Rent caps and controls are of course not universally despised and a balance must be struck between protecting tenants and unlocking the investment that delivers the new housing. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The latest consultation on exemptions for certain types of properties from rent control closed earlier this month. There will be investors with capital looking for a home waiting to see if the legislative and political environment in Scotland means they should be deploying more of this in Scotland or continuing to explore opportunities which guarantee a better return elsewhere.
Scotsman
16 minutes ago
- Scotsman
Why Keir Starmer's government needs to urgently recognise Palestine
Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... It seems that with every day the situation we see depicted in news footage from Gaza becomes more hopeless. More horrific. Every report to the UK Parliament becomes more difficult to listen to, more frustrating as we know that whatever calls we make to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are unlikely to be heeded. What we're seeing is difficult to believe because we want to hold onto the hope that it isn't possible. We hear journalists describing the crisis are facing the same deprivations. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Increasingly there is agreement across Parliament that it is time we recognised Palestine as a state. We cannot wait for a peace process, one which has consistently failed to deliver its only aim, to come to an agreed path to statehood for the Palestinians. For too many people, it's already too late. Palestinian and Israeli alike. A boy, clearly in distress, queues for food in a charity kitchen in Gaza City earlier this month (Picture: Bashar Taleb) | AFP via Getty Images Students trapped in Gaza This week I received a letter of thanks from a Palestinian academic. A writer and scholar, she wanted me to know how grateful she was that I had written asking the UK Government to ensure safe passage of students and researchers to the University of Edinburgh. She has an unconditional offer to study for a PhD in English literature there, but the closure of the UK visa office in Gaza is denying her and others the opportunity to escape, leaving her stranded amidst the devastation of war. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The week before, I sat in Parliament with an Israeli mother who pleaded for MPs' support to press for the release of her son's body. He was one of the 251 hostages taken on October 7. The world they both knew, and we recognised, changed forever that day. A world shocked by the brutality of the Hamas attack and murder of almost 1,200 people, the largest loss of Jewish life since the Holocaust, stood in solidarity and mourning with Israel. Since then, the Hamas-controlled Health Ministry claims almost 58,000 people have died and 90 per cent of homes have been destroyed. Israel's right to defend itself against Hamas after October 7 was in no doubt. But the scale of the destruction and acute humanitarian crisis in Gaza which ensued has brought widespread condemnation. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'A concentration camp' Many of us who have long regarded ourselves as friends of Israel are distraught at Netanyahu's failure to heed international opinion. One of his predecessors, Ehud Olmert, has criticised the government's plans for a so-called 'humanitarian city' for the Palestinians in Gaza saying: 'It is a concentration camp. I'm sorry.' It has to stop. Myself and my fellow Liberal Democrat MPs have already written to the government calling for recognition of Palestine. And pressure has been mounting this weekend on Keir Starmer to follow French President Emmanuel Macron's lead and announce immediate recognition as others have done. We know that has not been the preferred timescale of this government. Foreign Secretary David Lammy said recently: '…I wish I could say that if we were to recognise tomorrow, it would bring this war to an end, but I am afraid I am not sure that is the case. What is required now is painstaking diplomacy to get to a ceasefire…' For those whose lives have been destroyed, or whose loved ones have been lost, that may not be enough.
