UK urges Israel to protect aid workers

David Cameron demanded this afternoon that Israel “make major changes to ensure the safety of aid workers on the ground” after an Israeli air strike in Gaza last night killed seven food aid workers, including three British nationals.

The foreign secretary labelled the death of the World Central Kitchen team – who were reportedly travelling in a three-car convoy, two of which were armoured and bearing the WCK logo – “deeply distressing”. After speaking to his counterpart, Israel Katz, he called on Israel to investigate and explain how the incident could have occurred.  The Israeli ambassador was also summoned to the Foreign Office and urged to put in place “an effective deconfliction mechanism immediately and urgently to scale up humanitarian access.”

The fatal strike is a triple disaster: for the charity’s team, for Israel’s diplomatic relations, and for the starving people of Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted the convoy was hit accidentally, saying: “This happens in wartime,” adding that it is “a tragic case of our forces unintentionally hitting innocent people in the Gaza Strip.” IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari promised a fact-finding mission to probe what happened.

The WCK had just unloaded food brought into Gaza via sea when its convoy came under attack. The US-based organisation has close coordination with the IDF and, for the safety of its team, says it always notifies Israel about its movements in what is known as a “deconfliction” system.

The WCK has distributed more than 42 million meals over the last 175 days in Gaza. And, as Hagari himself acknowledged today, it also provided vital support to Israelis following Hamas’s October 7 attack in Israel.

The charity has now announced it is pausing all operations in the Palestinian enclave in light of Israel’s “unforgivable attack”. Another US-based charity, American Near East Refugee Aid, has followed suit. 

The IDF’s apology for the strike is unsurprising, given the nationalities of the victims. Aside from killing British aid workers, other foreign nationals killed aboard the convoy include an Australian, a Pole and US-Canadian citizen. And at a time when the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza is already placing increasing strain on Israel’s relations with its allies.

While the nationalities of the WCK team give this attack greater geopolitical significance, for the Palestinian aid workers also killed on the convoy, this is not an isolated incident.

Since Israel’s offensive in Gaza began, almost six months ago, at least 196 aid workers have lost their lives in the Palestinian territories, according to the Aid Worker Security Database, funded by the US Agency for International Development.

The deadly attack on the WCK team will make it that bit harder for Israel to maintain its narrative that it is doing everything it can both to minimise civilian casualties and to facilitate the delivery of aid inside the strip. 

Ultimately, the tragedy will only further perpetuate the suffering for Palestinian civilians. 

The WCK – which has played an increasingly prominent role in supporting Gazans in recent months – had just unloaded a second 400-tonne shipment of aid by sea from Cyprus when its convoy came under attack. 

This afternoon, Cyprus’s foreign ministry reported that ships bound for Gaza carrying another 240 tonnes of aid are set to turn around without completing their delivery, after the WCK suspended its operations in the Palestinian enclave. Which means one less buffer to prevent Gaza from sliding into famine. 

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