Polio vaccination campaign continues in Gaza despite ongoing Israeli bombardment
As we mentioned in the opening summary, a large-scale vaccination campaign to inoculate children against the newly emerged threat of polio in the Gaza Strip has continued into its third day.
Israel has agreed to limited pauses in fighting to facilitate the campaign, according to the World Health Organization. But despite this pledge, there are reports of Israel continuing to launch airstrikes on Gaza.
A journalist from the Agence France-Presse news agency reported troops blowing up homes in Gaza City and warplanes hitting a house to the east overnight into Tuesday.
The territory’s civil defence agency said Israel carried out a deadly strike on a tent sheltering displaced people in southern Khan Younis, as well as bombarding central Gaza.
Israel said the polio vaccination programme, which is hoped to reach some 640,000 Palestinian children, would continue through 9 September and last eight hours a day.
Key events
Phil Rosenberg, president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, criticised the government’s decision to suspend some arms sales to Israel as sending a “terrible message” in the country’s “hour of need”.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, he said:
On the day that those beautiful people were being buried, kidnapped from a music festival like Reading or Glastonbury, the UK decides to send a signal that it’s Israel that it wants to penalise, and that is a terrible, terrible message to be sending both to Israel in its hour of need, also to Hamas about the consequences – where consequences are for the horrific actions that Hamas has taken as a terrorist organisation, but also to other allies and adversaries around the world. So it is the wrong decision taken very much at the wrong time.
The chief rabbi, meanwhile, said the government’s decision to suspend some arms licences to Israel “beggars belief”.
Ephraim Mirvis posted on social media yesterday evening, saying the announcement “feeds the falsehood that Israel is in breach of international humanitarian law”.
“Sadly, this announcement will serve to encourage our shared enemies,” he said, as he criticised the suspension announcement’s timing – coming on the same day as the funerals of six Israeli hostages killed by Hamas.
It beggars belief that the British government, a close strategic ally of Israel, has announced a partial suspension of arms licences, at a time when Israel is fighting a war for its very survival on seven fronts forced upon it on the 7th October, and at the very moment when six…
— Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis (@chiefrabbi) September 2, 2024
Hannah Bond, co-CEO of ActionAid UK, is among those who say the British government should halt all new and existing arms licenses to Israel, arguing that the UK risks being “complicit” in the daily atrocities being committed in Gaza.
In a statement, Bond said:
Now is not the time for half measures: if the UK government believes the Israeli military may be breaching international humanitarian law in Gaza, then it should go much further and halt all new and existing arms licenses to the Israeli government immediately.
Until it does, the UK remains at risk of being complicit in the atrocities taking place in Gaza daily. After 11 months of horror, it’s time for the UK to apply maximum pressure on the Israeli government to secure a permanent ceasefire and the release of the hostages – and finally put an end to this nightmare.
F35 jets ‘deliberately’ not included in UK’s suspension of some arms sales to Israel, defence secretary says
The UK’s defence secretary, John Healey, has been asked by the BBC why components for F35 jets are not included in the suspension.
He said there was a “deliberate carve out” for the jets, of which there are about 1,000 that are used by 20 countries around the world.
“The UK makes important, critical components for all those jets that go into a global pool,” he said, adding that it’s “hard to distinguish” which components would go into Israeli jets because of this.
“This is a global supply chain, with the UK a vital part of that supply chain. We are not prepared to put at risk the operation of fighter jets that are central to our own UK security, that of our allies and of Nato.” He has rejected claims that the announcement was Labour simply making a political gesture.
Healey told Times Radio that the country’s suspension of 30 of its 350 arms export licences to Israel will not threaten Israel’s ability to defend itself.
“It will not have a material impact on Israel’s security,” he said this morning.
Healey said he informed his Israeli counterpart, Yoav Gallant, about the suspension before it was announced.
He said:
As I said to the defence minister Yoav Gallant yesterday when I spoke to him before the announcement, we have a duty to follow the law, but this does not alter our unshakable commitment to support Israel’s right to self-defence and to the defence of Israel if it comes under direct attack again, just as UK jets back in April helped intercept Iranian drones and missiles that were targeted directly at Israeli civilians.
Gallant said he was deeply disheartened by the UK’s decision, while Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, said he was “disappointed” by it, adding it sent “a very problematic message” to Hamas and “its sponsors in Iran”.
UK’s suspension of 30 arms export licences to Israel ‘little more than window dressing’, Oxfam chief says
Oxfam GB have responded to the UK suspending 30 out of 350 UK arms licenses to Israel because of a “clear risk” they may be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of international humanitarian law.
The charity’s chief executive, Halima Begum, welcomed the suspension of some of the licenses but called for the British government to go further in order to reduce the high number of Palestinian civilians being killed in Israeli airstrikes on Gaza. More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli attacks since 7 October, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
The UK foreign secretary, David Lammy, who made the announcement, said the suspension would almost entirely exclude all UK components for the F-35 fighter jet programme, seen as a significant loophole by many as Israel is using the jets in its bombardment of the Gaza Strip.
Begum, who took over as Oxfam GB chief executive in April, called for the suspension of all arms exports, saying the government’s slight shift in policy was “little more than window dressing” as Israel can still order weapons via third parties.
She said:
The government’s suspension of some weapons exports to Israel is welcome recognition of the clear risk that Israel is using UK arms in serious breaches of international humanitarian law in Gaza.
But suspending just 30 licences out of 350, and crucially leaving loopholes for components in F-35 fighter jets that have been dropping 2,000-pound bombs on Palestinians for months now, is nowhere near adequate.
In the time Parliament has been in recess alone, Oxfam estimates that over 1,100 people have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli military. By leaving a loophole that allows Israel to order weapons via third parties, the suspension is little more than window dressing.
Stronger, more committed action from the UK government is urgently needed, with a suspension of all arms exports and the closure of all loopholes.
Polio vaccination campaign continues in Gaza despite ongoing Israeli bombardment
As we mentioned in the opening summary, a large-scale vaccination campaign to inoculate children against the newly emerged threat of polio in the Gaza Strip has continued into its third day.
Israel has agreed to limited pauses in fighting to facilitate the campaign, according to the World Health Organization. But despite this pledge, there are reports of Israel continuing to launch airstrikes on Gaza.
A journalist from the Agence France-Presse news agency reported troops blowing up homes in Gaza City and warplanes hitting a house to the east overnight into Tuesday.
The territory’s civil defence agency said Israel carried out a deadly strike on a tent sheltering displaced people in southern Khan Younis, as well as bombarding central Gaza.
Israel said the polio vaccination programme, which is hoped to reach some 640,000 Palestinian children, would continue through 9 September and last eight hours a day.
IDF raids will see Israeli hostages return ‘in coffins’, Hamas armed wing says
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of Israel’s war in Gaza and the wider crisis in the Middle East.
Hamas’s armed wing, al-Qassam Brigades, has said hostages would return to Israel “inside coffins” if military pressure continued, warning that new instructions were issued in June to militants guarding the captives on what to do if Israeli troops approached.
Spokesperson Abu Obeida said in a statement: “[Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s insistence on liberating the prisoners through military pressure instead of concluding a deal will mean that they will return to their families inside coffins.”
The announcement comes days after Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) recovered the bodies of six hostages from a tunnel in the southern Gaza city of Rafah. According to Israel’s health ministry, they had been shot at close range about two days before their remains were discovered.
The new instructions, Obeida said, were given to guards of hostages after a rescue operation by Israel in June. At that time, Israeli forces freed four hostages in a raid in which scores of Palestinians, including women and children, were killed.
In a press conference on Monday, the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said: “Israel will not accept the massacre of six hostages, Hamas will pay a heavy price.”
Below is a summary of some of the latest developments:
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The US president, Joe Biden, said that a “final” deal for the release of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza was “very close” but that he did not think the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, was doing enough to secure such an agreement. Netanyahu, in a press conference, said he did not believe that Biden made those comments.
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Netanyahu insisted that Israeli forces must retain control over the Philadelphi Corridor along the Egypt-Gaza border, which has emerged as a primary sticking point in Gaza ceasefire talks. He described it as “Hamas’s oxygen pipe”.
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The UK moved to immediately suspend 30 arms export licences to Israel after a review by the government found a “clear risk” that UK arms may be used in serious violation of humanitarian law relating to the treatment of Palestinian detainees and the supply of aid to Gaza.
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Protests against the Israeli leader’s government suffered a blow yesterday when a court ordered an early end to a general strike. Israel’s biggest trade union, Histadrut, said hundreds of thousands of people joined its strike. Israel’s labour court ruled that the strike, which affected many businesses, schools and transport routes, had to end at 14:30 local time (12:30 BST). It was due to finish at 18:00 local time (16:00 BST).
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The demonstrations were prompted by the discovery of the bodies of six hostages in Gaza, and brought tens of thousands of Israelis out on to the streets to protest against the government’s handling of the war in Gaza and efforts to release dozens of hostages who remain in captivity.
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Ben Gurion international airport near Tel Aviv saw some flights delayed, and none at all for two hours leading up to 10am. Tel Aviv and the northern coastal city of Haifa heeded the strike calls, but not all municipalities slowed down or ceased their activities.
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Further protests took place outside Netanyahu’s residences in Jerusalem and Caesarea.
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At least 40,786 Palestinian people have been killed and 94,224 injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Monday.
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UN agencies and other organisations will administer polio vaccines to children under the age of 10 in central Gaza today, as the vaccination campaign continues for its third day. The health ministry said about 160,000 children received the first dose of the polio vaccine in the central governorate in the Gaza Strip on Sunday and Monday.
