More than 120 Palestinians die of hunger as Israel starves, bombs Gaza

The live blog has now ended and will be back tomorrow at 9am BST. You can read more of The New Arab's coverage of Israel's war on Gaza here.

A minor opposition party in the British parliament on Sunday threatened to bring forward legislation on recognising Palestinian statehood and "force a vote" if Prime Minister Keir Starmer continues to oppose the move.

The Scottish National Party (SNP), which pushes for the independence of Scotland, said it would table a "Palestine Recognition Bill" when parliament returns after its summer recess if Starmer did not change his position.

The prime minister has committed to recognising Palestinian statehood but said it must be part of a peace process in the Middle East.

The SNP threat comes after more than 220 British MPs, including dozens from Starmer's ruling Labour party, demanded Friday that the UK government follow France and recognise a Palestinian state.

Israel's military said Saturday that it airdropped humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, as thousands of Palestinians face the threat of widespread famine.

"In accordance with the directives of the political echelon, the IDF recently carried out an airdrop of humanitarian aid as part of the ongoing efforts to allow and facilitate the entry of aid into the Gaza Strip," the military posted on Telegram.

The drop included seven packages of aid containing flour, sugar and canned food, it added.

Israel's far-right National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has criticised the Israeli government's allowing of greater levels of aid to enter the Gaza Strip, calling it a surrender to Hamas.

"The only way to win the war and return the hostages is to completely stop 'humanitarian' aid, occupy the entire strip and encourage voluntary migration," Ben-Gvir wrote on X.

Arab countries will for the first time condemn Hamas and call for its disarmament early next week at a United Nations ministerial event in New York, a move meant to lure more European countries to recognize Palestinian statehood, France's foreign minister said on Saturday.

In an exclusive interview with French weekly Le Journal du Dimanche, Minister of Foreign and European Affairs Jean-Noel Barrot said the move was part of a long-planned initiative between France and Saudi Arabia.

"For the first time, Arab countries will condemn Hamas and call for its disarmament, which will seal its definitive isolation. European countries will in turn confirm their intention to recognize the State of Palestine. Half of European countries have done so, all others are considering it," Barrot told the JDD.

"The British Prime Minister has stated his intention to do so. Germany is considering it at a later stage. We will launch an appeal in New York for other countries to join us in order to set in motion an even more ambitious and demanding process that will culminate on September 21," Barrot added.

The EU's former foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, has called for accountability against countries that are not doing enough to stop Israel's war on Gaza.

In a series of posts on X, Borrell said: "It seems that for the heart to feel, the eyes must see. Images of children dying of hunger have moved even Germany to call for an end to the tragedy. But how does it expect to achieve that if it refuses to adopt any sanctions against Israel? Kind words do not feed the hungry."

"What happens just 500 km from Europe's borders is not only a humanitarian tragedy, but a moral crisis that challenges all of humanity. It is time to start holding accountable those whose inaction also makes them complicit in the deaths of so many civilians by hunger, bombs," he added.

Israeli troops boarded the Handala, a boat operated by the pro-Palestinian activist group Freedom Flotilla and sailing to Gaza, on Saturday, according to a livestream broadcast by the group.

The broadcast showed the activists sat on deck, holding their hands up and whistling the Italian anti-fascist song "Bella Ciao", as the soldiers took control of the vessel.

Three video livefeeds of the scene, which had been broadcast online, were cut minutes later.

The Israeli military said that designated humanitarian corridors would be established to enable the safe movement of United Nations convoys delivering aid to the Gaza population, and that humanitarian pauses would be implemented in densely populated areas.

Moreover, Palestinian sources confirmed that aid has begun dropping in northern Gaza.

The Lebanese health ministry said three people were killed in Israeli strikes on the south on Saturday despite a ceasefire, as the Israeli military said one of them targeted a Hezbollah militant.

"The Israeli enemy drone strike that targeted a vehicle" in Tyre district "killed one person", a ministry statement said.

The Israeli military said that it "struck and eliminated" a Hezbollah commander who was "involved in efforts to rehabilitate the terrorist organisation in the area of Bint Jbeil" near the border.

It did not specify where the strike took place.

The Lebanese health ministry later reported that another Israeli strike in Tyre district, on the town of Debaal, killed two people. The state-run National News Agency reported that it targeted a house.

 Israel will resume airdrop aid to Gaza on Saturday night, the Israeli military said, a few days after more than 100 aid agencies warned that mass starvation was spreading across the enclave.

"The airdrops will include seven pallets of aid containing flour, sugar, and canned food to be provided by international organizations," the military added in a statement.

The United Arab Emirates will resume aid drops over Gaza at once, its foreign minister said Saturday, citing the "critical" humanitarian situation in the blockaded territory, where aid groups have warned of mass starvation.

"The humanitarian situation in Gaza has reached a critical and unprecedented level," Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan said in a post on X. "We will ensure essential aid reaches those most in need, whether through land, air or sea. Air drops are resuming once more, immediately."

Israeli's are protesting against the government and demanding a Gaza ceasefire for a captive exchange, with Einav Zangauker, mother of captive Matan, currently held in Gaza.

At a rally outside the Israeli military's headquarters, Zangauker said: "We defeated Hamas, and because of Israel’s insistence on a few meters of land, Matan will pay with his life," according to the Times of Israel, adding, "If the negotiations crumble, with it, my Matan will crumble; he and the other 49 hostages will crumble."

She also took aim at far-right government ministers Bezalel Smitrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir over their insistence on continuing the war, saying: "The concepts that Ben Gvir and Smotrich forced on us have failed."

Israel has killed 10 Palestinians waiting for food aid near an aid site in northwest Gaza, according to Al Jazeera, citing medical sources. 

At least six people, including two children, have been killed in an Israeli drone strike on a tent camp in al-Mawasi, according to a report by Wafa news agency.

Several others were injured and have been taken to Nasser Hospital for treatment.

Gaza’s Health Ministry reports that five more people have died in the past 24 hours due to Israeli-enforced starvation, as hospitals continue to document the growing humanitarian catastrophe.

The total number of deaths from hunger in Gaza has now reached 127, including 85 children.

Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli fire killed 25 people on Saturday in the Palestinian territory devastated by more than 21 months of war.

Agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP the dead included nine people killed in three separate air strikes in Gaza City.

Eleven people were killed in four separate strikes near the southern city of Khan Yunis, while two were killed in a drone strike in Nuseirat refugee camp, he added.

Bassal said three people were killed by Israeli gunfire while waiting for aid in three separate incidents in northern, central and southern Gaza.

One of the three was killed "after Israeli forces opened fire on people waiting for humanitarian aid" northwest of Gaza City, the agency said.

Witnesses told AFP that several thousand people had gathered in the area.

Activists aboard the Handala ship announced on Saturday that they are nearing the Gaza coast, having already passed the point where last month’s Madleen flotilla was halted by Israeli forces.

The vessel departed from Italy earlier this week, with activists declaring, “The world is watching.”

As of Saturday afternoon, the ship was roughly 200 kilometres from Gaza, and the Israeli navy is preparing to intercept it, according to The Jerusalem Post.

All eyes on Handala pic.twitter.com/RlhLpoR2CM

— Handala (@handala0) July 26, 2025

Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen has strongly criticised former President Donald Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and their decision to replace humanitarian aid organisations in Gaza with what he described as "mercenaries"- leading to more death and devastation.”

"Every day, the horrors in Gaza reach new, unimaginable depths,” Van Hollen wrote in a social media post.

He also noted that hundreds of Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire while attempting to access aid from the US-backed Global Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).

"This cannot continue," Van Hollen added.

The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees said Saturday that planned airdrops of aid into the Gaza Strip would not solve severe food shortages caused by months of restrictions on the entry of supplies.

"Airdrops will not reverse the deepening starvation. They are expensive, inefficient & can even kill starving civilians," UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini wrote on X, calling the wave of hunger affecting Gaza "manmade".

An Israeli official told news agency AFP on Friday that aid drops in Gaza would resume soon, adding they would be conducted by the United Arab Emirates and Jordan.

The humanitarian situation in the Palestinian territory has gravely deteriorated in recent days, with international NGOs warning of soaring malnutrition among children.

"Lift the siege, open the gates & guarantee safe movements + dignified access to people in need," Lazzarini said, referring to the various entry points under Israeli control that regulate access into Gaza.

The United States on Saturday criticized the release from a French prison of pro-Palestinian Lebanese militant Georges Ibrahim Abdallah, who spent more than 40 years behind bars for the killings of two diplomats, one of them American.

Abdallah was detained in 1984 and sentenced to life in prison in 1987 for his involvement in the murders of US military attache Charles Robert Ray and Israeli diplomat Yacov Barsimantov in Paris.

Earlier this month, a French appeals court ordered Abdallah's release on the condition that he leave French territory and never return. He left a prison in southwest France on Friday and later arrived in his hometown in Lebanon.

"The United States opposes the French government's release and expulsion to Lebanon of convicted terrorist Georges Ibrahim Abdallah," State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said in a statement on social media.

"His release threatens the safety of US diplomats abroad and is a grave injustice to the victims and the families of those killed. The United States will continue to support the pursuit of justice in this matter."

Pro-Palestinian activists disrupted the official opening of the prestigious Salzburg Festival 2025 in Austria, interrupting a speech by Vice-Chancellor Andreas Babler with chants and banners condemning Israel’s actions in Gaza.

According to the dpa news agency, protesters shouted “blood on your hands” and held signs reading “Stop the genocide” during the event.

Babler responded by inviting them to an “open discussion” as they were escorted out by security.

Pro Palestina Störaktion bei den Salzburger Festspielen.
Gefilmt bzw. veröffentlicht wurden diese Szenen von einem FPÖler.

Quelle folgt im Anschluss, an dieses Posting. pic.twitter.com/5dTloiT9t0

— Rinaldo Mogyorosy (@RMogyorosy) July 26, 2025

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Saturday spoke to his French and German counterparts and outlined UK plans to get aid to people in Gaza and evacuate sick and injured children, his office said.

"The prime minister set out how the UK will also be taking forward plans to work with partners such as Jordan to airdrop aid and evacuate children requiring medical assistance," a statement said.

In a phone conversation, Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and the German Chancellor Friedrich Merz discussed the humanitarian situation in Gaza "which they agreed is appalling".

"They all agreed it would be vital to ensure robust plans are in place to turn an urgently needed ceasefire into lasting peace," according to a readout released by Downing Street.

"They discussed their intention to work closely together on a plan.... which would pave the way to a long-term solution and security in the region. They agreed that once this plan was worked up, they would seek to bring in other key partners, including in the region, to advance it," it added.

Syrian and Israeli officials held talks in Paris mediated by the United States about containing any escalation in southern Syria, Syria's state-run Ekhbariya TV reported on Saturday, citing a diplomatic source.

The diplomatic source said the meeting did not result in any final agreements but they agreed to continue talks and evaluate steps aimed at maintaining stability in southern Syria.

An Israeli drone strike has killed one person in Lebanon’s southern Tyre district, according to the country’s National News Agency. The attack targeted a vehicle travelling along a road between two towns in the area.

The Israeli military has not yet issued a statement regarding the strike.

However, Israel has previously carried out targeted assassinations in southern Lebanon, claiming those killed were Hezbollah members attempting to reestablish a military foothold near the border.

Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli operations killed 11 people on Saturday in the Palestinian territory devastated by over 21 months of war.

Civil defence spokesman Mahmoud Bassal told AFP the toll included four Palestinians killed in an air strike on the Al-Rimal neighbourhood of Gaza City in the territory's north.

One other person was killed "after Israeli forces opened fire on people waiting for humanitarian aid" northwest of Gaza City, the agency said.

The group Doctors Against Genocide has staged a series of protests across Washington, DC, calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and an end to what they describe as Israel’s starvation policy against the besieged territory.

The demonstrations have taken place at key locations including the US Congress, the Egyptian and Israeli embassies, and the White House, as medical professionals urge US and international leaders to act to stop the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Gaza’s Government Media Office has issued a stark warning about an "unprecedented and imminent humanitarian disaster" unfolding in the Strip, accusing Israel of deliberately endangering the lives of tens of thousands of infants.

According to a statement released on Saturday, around 100,000 children aged two and under- including 40,000 infants- are at risk of death within days due to a “complete lack of baby milk and nutritional supplements,” as well as Israel’s ongoing closure of border crossings and restrictions on humanitarian aid.

“We are facing an expected and deliberate mass killing slowly being committed against infants whose mothers have been breastfeeding them water instead of baby milk for days, as a result of the starvation and extermination policy pursued by the ‘Israeli’ occupation,” the statement said.

At least 25 people were killed by Israeli airstrikes and gunshots overnight, according to health officials and the ambulance service on Saturday, as ceasefire talks appear to have stalled and Palestinians in Gaza face famine.

The majority of victims were killed by gunfire as they waited for aid trucks close to the Zikim crossing with Israel, said staff at Shifa hospital, where the bodies were brought.

Israel's army didn’t respond to the latest shootings.

Those killed in strikes include four people in an apartment building in Gaza City among others, hospital staff and the ambulance service said.

The strikes come as ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas have hit a standstill after the U.S and Israel recalled their negotiating teams on Thursday, throwing the future of the talks into further uncertainty.

Gaza’s Civil Defence says its teams in Rafah and Khan Younis have recovered the bodies of 12 Palestinians from an area previously targeted by Israeli forces.

In a brief statement, the agency said its workers were able to access the Morag area, north of Rafah, after coordinating with Israeli authorities and the United Nations.

The recovered bodies are being transferred to Nasser Hospital, the statement added.

Senior Hamas official Izzat al-Risheq has pushed back against US President Donald Trump’s portrayal of ceasefire negotiations in Gaza, following Trump’s claim that Palestinian negotiators “didn’t really want to make a deal.”

In a Telegram post, al-Risheq, a member of Hamas’s political bureau, said the remarks by Trump and his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff did not “align with the progress of the negotiation process, which was actually witnessing progress.”

He argued that statements from Trump and Witkoff — who accused Hamas of not “acting in good faith” after US negotiators ended talks in Qatar — ignored “the real impediment to all agreements, which is the Netanyahu government.”

Al-Risheq added that Hamas had demonstrated significant flexibility during negotiations and was committed to reaching a comprehensive agreement to end the suffering in Gaza.

He urged the US to stop “exonerating the occupation and providing it with political and military cover to continue the war of extermination and starvation.”

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees has renewed its call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, warning that starvation is tightening its grip as Israeli attacks continue without pause.

In a statement shared on X, UNRWA said Palestinians “are once again forced to be displaced” by Israeli forces in the blockaded enclave.

“They have nowhere to go. No one is safe in Gaza. Not aid workers, not medical workers, not UN staff. No one has been spared.”

People are once again forced to be displaced in #Gaza by Israeli Authorities orders.

They have nowhere to go.

🚫 No one is safe in Gaza.

🚫 No place is safe in Gaza.

🚫 Not aid workers, not medical workers, not UN staff.

🚫 No one has been spared.

People have endured over… pic.twitter.com/SgsY5LqZ2Q

— UNRWA (@UNRWA) July 26, 2025

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has warned that recognising the State of Palestine before it is officially established could have negative consequences.

“I am very much in favour of the State of Palestine but I am not in favour of recognising it prior to establishing it,” Meloni told the Italian newspaper La Repubblica.

“If something that doesn’t exist is recognised on paper, the problem could appear to be solved when it isn’t,” she added.

France’s move to support recognition of a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly this September faced strong opposition from both Israel and the United States, amid Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza.

On Friday, Italy’s foreign minister stated that recognition of a Palestinian state must come alongside reciprocal recognition of Israel by the new Palestinian group.

At least eight people, including five civilians and three assailants, were killed during a "terrorist attack" on a judiciary building in southeast Iran, state media reported.

"Unknown gunmen attacked the judiciary centre in Zahedan," the capital of southeastern Sistan Baluchistan province, the judiciary's Mizan Online said.

"Five people have been killed and 13 injured in this terrorist attack," it added. Separately, the official IRNA news agency reported that three of the attackers were killed during the assault.

The Israeli military said a "projectile" was fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel on Saturday.

"A projectile was identified crossing the Gaza Strip from the south and most likely falling in an open area," the military said in a statement, adding that there were no injuries reported.