UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy leaves the weekly cabinet meeting on Downing Street in London. Getty Images
UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy leaves the weekly cabinet meeting on Downing Street in London. Getty Images
UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy leaves the weekly cabinet meeting on Downing Street in London. Getty Images
UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy leaves the weekly cabinet meeting on Downing Street in London. Getty Images

Lammy backtracks on claim Israel broke international law in Gaza


Damien McElroy
  • English
  • Arabic

Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza

David Lammy, the UK Foreign Secretary, has been forced to backtrack on assertions that Israel was breaking international law following its resumption of hostilities in Gaza.

Mr Lammy was hailed earlier in the week for making the first statement from a UK government minister that Israel was in breach of its obligations for blocking aid flows to Gaza for more than two weeks. However, after a Downing Street intervention, he reversed his statement, to renewed criticism.

That came after he had reiterated his point in the House of Commons. “I did say in my contribution that it is in breach of international humanitarian law,” he said.

A secure and permanent end to this conflict is the only way out
David Lammy

Mr Lammy backtracked on Tuesday. The UK government position remains there is a “clear risk” of Israel breaking the law.

“Ultimately of course, these are matters for the courts to determine but it’s difficult to see how denying humanitarian assistance to a civilian population can be compatible with international humanitarian law,” Mr Lammy said.

Advocates of the UK taking a much stronger stance were outraged by the reversal and questioned whether the Foreign Secretary was being undermined in public. “It undermines the government’s claims that it respects international law and exposes a clear chasm between the Prime Minister and his Foreign Secretary,” said Chris Doyle, a campaigner who runs the Council for Arab-British Understanding.

Mr Lammy also warned that “a return to full-scale fighting is in no one’s interest”.

“We continue to condemn Hamas, of course, and believe in Israel’s right to security, but all parties must re-engage with negotiations to get the remaining hostages out," he said. "We do need to continue to surge aid into Gaza and a secure and permanent end to this conflict is the only way out.”

A UN Security Council meeting on Gaza on Tuesday night saw urgent appeals to lift the renewed Israeli blockade. Tom Fletcher, the UN Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, said the ceasefire process was working, returning hostages and allowing the delivery of humanitarian aid. He appealed for intervention to stop the situation going into reverse.

“What does it say about our values that we can't stop a 21st century atrocity happening before our eyes, and not just happening but being cheered on before our eyes,” he asked on the BBC on Wednesday. “I'm saying: get this blockade lifted so we can save survivors and get a ceasefire back in place so we get hostages home to their families and avoid thousands more deaths.”

James Kariuki, the UK Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, also spoke at the meeting and said the new restriction on aid “risks violating” international law. “This conflict cannot be resolved through military means,” he said. “We want to see the ceasefire re-established as soon as possible.”

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Barcelona v Liverpool, Wednesday, 11pm (UAE).

Second leg

Liverpool v Barcelona, Tuesday, May 7, 11pm

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Copa del Rey

Semi-final, first leg

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Second leg, February 27

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Uefa Champions League final:

Who: Real Madrid v Liverpool
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When: Saturday, May 26, 10.45pm (UAE)
TV: Match on BeIN Sports

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Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.

The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.

Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.

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November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.

May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.

April 2017Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.

February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.

December 2016A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.

July 2016Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.

May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.

New Year's Eve 2011A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.

Updated: March 20, 2025, 6:13 AM