Benedict Cumberbatch, Riz Ahmed, Dua Lipa and Annie Lennox are among 300 public figures to have signed an open letter calling on UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer to end the country’s “complicity” in the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
“We urge you to take immediate action to end the UK’s complicity in the horrors in Gaza,” read the letter. “Right now, children in Gaza are starving while food and medicine sit just minutes away, blocked at the border. Words won’t feed Palestinian children – we need action. Every single one of Gaza’s 2.1 million people is at risk of starvation, as you read this.
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“Mothers, fathers, babies, grandparents – an entire people left to starve before the world’s eyes. 290,000 children are on the brink of death – starved by the Israeli government for more than 70 days.”
The signatories called for an immediate suspension of all UK arms sales to Israel; immediate humanitarian access for experienced aid agencies and commitment from the UK government to assist in brokering a ceasefire.
Further entertainment world figures getting behind the letter include Tobias Menzies, Tilda Swinton, Toby Jones, Steve Coogan, Sadie Frost, Ruth Negga, Lily Cole, and Mark Ruffalo.
The initiative comes amid growing international disquiet about the 20-month Israeli military campaign in the Gaza Strip, originally initiated in response to Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attacks on southern Israel, in which 1,200 people were killed and another 251 taken hostage.
The death toll in Gaza currently stands at more than 54,000 people according to the latest figures released by the territory’s Hamas-run health authority, with the territory on the brink of famine following Israel’s 11-week blockade of food supplies.
The letter was initiated by Choose Love, an NGO providing emergency and support to displaced communities.
“We need action from Keir Starmer now,” said the agency’s co-founder and CEO Josie Naughton. “That means stopping all arms sales and licenses, making sure that legitimate humanitarian organisations can reach people in Gaza. It means doing everything possible to make these horrors end. Action is a choice, just as inaction is one. History will remember what we did in this moment. We are begging the Prime Minister to make the right choice.”
Israel resumed aid deliveries last week, but the United Nations says not enough supplies are making it into the territory to end food shortages. Overnight a crowd of desperate people broke into a warehouse in the strip looking for food, with two people killed and many injured in the scrum.
The governments of U.K. and Western allies including France, Italy, Germany and Canada have been emphatic in their backing of Israel in the wake of the October 7 attacks.
However, a number of European leaders have expressed concerns over the Israel’s actions in Gaza in recent days.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz told a press conference in Finland earlier this week that Israel’s ongoing bombardment of Gaza was “beyond comprehension”, while top EU diplomat, Kaja Kallas said on Wednesday that Israeli strikes in Gaza went beyond what was “necessary to fight Hamas”.
In the UK, Foreign Minister David Lammy summoned the Israeli ambassador and suspended talks on a trade deal on May 20, calling Israel’s blockade on aid into Gaza, “intolerable” and “morally wrong, unjustifiable”. However, top UK trade envoy Lord Austin went ahead with a trip to Israel this week to bolster ties between the two countries.
Thursday’s letter follows a number of similar and separate letters to Starmer this week, from groups ranging from top lawyers to a collective of UK and Ireland writers, with signatories including Zadie Smith and Ian McEwan.
The full-list of signatories:
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Dr Inua Ellams. MBE. FRSA. FRSL.
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Professor Jacqueline Rose
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