The French Foreign Minister has suggested sanctioning Israel over aid access to Gaza, whilst influential Senator Elizabeth Warren says Israeli actions in Gaza may be “genocide”.
France’s Foreign Minister put forward on Tuesday the possibility of sanctions on Israel to pressure it to get humanitarian aid into Gaza.
World Leaders Warn Israel Over Rafah
The leaders of France, Egypt and Jordan warned Israel on Monday against a threatened offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, urging an “immediate” ceasefire in a joint editorial published in several newspapers.
“Such an offensive will only bring more death and suffering, heighten the risks and consequences of mass forcible displacement of the people of Gaza and threaten regional escalation.”
The editorial was signed by France’s President Emmanuel Macron, Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Jordan’s King Abdullah II.
The United States said earlier it opposes any assault on Rafah, after Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said a date for an attack had been set.
The three leaders urged that a UN Security Council resolution calling for an “immediate ceasefire… be fully implemented without further delay” and that all hostages held by Hamas be released, also in line with the council’s demands.
“The war in Gaza and the catastrophic humanitarian suffering it is causing must end now,” the three leaders said in the op-ed published by Le Monde in France, the Washington Post in the United States, Al Rai in Jordan and Al Ahram in Egypt.
Israel is under growing international pressure to agree to a ceasefire, including from its top ally and arms supplier the United States.
But while negotiations continued, Netanyahu said a date has been set for sending troops into Rafah.
