The foreign secretary has denounced Israel’s actions in Gaza as “intolerable” but stopped short of saying it had committed genocide.

MPs could be heard shouting “genocide” in the Commons chamber as David Lammy announced the government was suspending its trade negotiations with Israel and summoning Tzipi Hotovely, Israel’s ambassador to the UK, to the Foreign Office.

The UK has also sanctioned a number of individuals and groups in the West Bank which it says have been linked with acts of violence against Palestinians – including Daniella Weiss, a leading settler activist who was the subject of Louis Theroux’s recent documentary The Settlers.

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Israel immediately criticised the UK government actions as “regrettable” and said the free trade agreement talks, which ministers have now backed out of, were “not being advanced at all by the UK government”.

Oren Marmorstein, a spokesperson for the Israeli foreign affairs ministry, said: “If, due to anti-Israel obsession and domestic political considerations, the British government is willing to harm the British economy – that is its own prerogative.”

Mr Lammy’s intervention came in response to Israel ramping up its latest military offensive in Gaza and its decision to limit the amount of aid into the enclave.

Tom Fletcher, head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, accused Israel of “deliberately and unashamedly” imposing inhumane conditions on Palestinians by blocking aid from entering Gaza more than 10 weeks ago.

He also told the UN’s security council last week that it must “act now” to “prevent genocide” – a claim that Israel has vehemently denied.

Speaking in the Commons, the foreign secretary said the threat of starvation was “hanging over hundreds of thousands of civilians” and that the 11-week blockade stopping humanitarian aid reaching Gaza was “indefensible and cruel”.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has agreed to allow a limited amount of aid into the besieged enclave in response to global concern at reports of famine.

Mr Lammy said Mr Netanyahu’s govenrment was “isolating Israel from its friends and partners around the world, undermining the interests of the Israeli people and damaging the image of the state of Israel in the eyes of the world”.

“We are now entering a dark new phase in this conflict,” Mr Lammy added.

“Netanyahu’s government is planning to drive Gazans from their homes into a corner of the strip to the south and permit them a fraction of the aid that they need.”

Referring to one of the far-right ministers in Mr Netanyahu’s government, he said Bezalel Smotrich “even spoke of Israeli forces cleansing Gaza, destroying what’s left of residents, Palestinians being relocated, he said, to third countries”.

MPs from across the house shouted “genocide” as Mr Lammy said: “We must call this what it is. It is extremism. It is dangerous. It is repellent. It is monstrous and I condemn it in the strongest possible terms.”

In the Commons, a number of Labour MPs urged the government to go further against Israel.

Yasmin Qureshi, the Labour MP for Bolton South and Walkden, said there needed to be a “full arms embargo” and said: “Can I ask the foreign secretary what additional steps he’s going to be taking in order to stave off this genocide?”

Another Labour MP told Sky News that while the statement was “better than previously…without a concrete timeline and a sanctioning of responsible ministers, it’s hard to know what tangible difference it will make.”

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Israeli officials have said its plans to seize all of Gaza and hold it indefinitely. – which would move the civilian population southward – will help it achieve its aim of defeating Hamas.

Israel also believes the offensive will prevent Hamas from looting and distributing humanitarian aid, which it says strengthens the group’s rule in Gaza.

Mr Netanyahu has defended Israel’s actions in Gaza and reacted angrily to a joint statement penned by the leaders of the UK, France and Canada, in which they urged Israel to end its military offensive in Gaza and lift restrictions on humanitarian aid allowed into the enclave.

The Israeli prime minister said: “By asking Israel to end a defensive war for our survival before Hamas terrorists on our border are destroyed and by demanding a Palestinian state, the leaders in London, Ottawa and Paris are offering a huge prize for the genocidal attack on Israel on October 7 while inviting more such atrocities.

“No nation can be expected to accept anything less and Israel certainly won’t. This is a war of civilisation over barbarism. Israel will continue to defend itself by just means until total victory is achieved.”

A British doctor working in Gaza has urged world leaders to “stop talking and do something” as he described how people are starving and the “massive extent of destruction”.

Dr Tom Potokar – who has compared Gaza to a “slaugherhouse” because of the bombardment by Israeli forces – is part of a group of British specialist doctors and surgeons currently working in Khan Younis.

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Sky News spent two days filming with them in Nasser and Amal hospitals – two of the last functioning hospitals in southern Gaza.

They are plastic surgeons and orthopaedic specialists. The operating theatres are a rare zone of calm as the medics work with the war outside and a constant stream of wounded needing urgent treatment.

All the patients are malnourished. Children are suffering the worst. The lack of food and water has made them weak and more vulnerable to their injuries.

Hospitals in Gaza have repeatedly come under attack during the war. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) claims Hamas has been hiding in them or in tunnels underneath.

Nasser hospital hasn’t escaped. The burns unit was one of the busiest parts of the hospital, until it was destroyed in an airstrike.

The doctors sleep and spend downtime in small living quarters within the hospital itself. Food is one ready meal a day, only 400 calories. The 11-week blockade is affecting everyone.

Dr Potokar was working in the European hospital on the western edge of Khan Younis but had to evacuate last week when it came under missile fire and had to close.

He went to Amal hospital next to Nasser and is working again.

He says he’s seen a dramatic change since he was last in Gaza shortly after the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023.

“The difference this time I think is the intensity,” he says.

“Back in October to December ’23 was the last time I was here, there was a lot of wounded, and it was very intense as well.

“I think the difference this time is because of the blockade there’s so little stuff getting in, there’s no food getting in so people are starving, there’s very little medical supplies coming in but also the other very noticeable thing is the massive extent of destruction – I mean Khan Younis looks like Stalingrad.”

Speaking about what he has witnessed in Gaza, Dr Potokar added: “What can you say, it’s horrific, it’s a slaughterhouse. That’s what it is, it’s a slaughterhouse.”

He also urged world leaders to “stop talking and do something”.

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The United Nations says 100 aid trucks were cleared for entry into Gaza on Tuesday, but Tom Fletcher, a former British diplomat who now heads the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, warned that 14,000 babies could die in the next 48 hours if they don’t receive urgent aid.

On Monday evening, the IDF-declared combat zone was only a few streets from the Nasser hospital. Drones flew low overhead through the day.

“An evacuation order for most of Khan Younis went out today, which meant we lost several members of the team,” said Dr Victoria Rose, a plastic surgeon.

“My anaesthetic nurse and Graeme’s orthopaedic colleague had to leave us mid-case to go and evacuate their families to an area of safety.”

Dr Graeme Groom added: “These are people just like you and me, they have their homes, their families, they live normal lives, many are very impressive people and without notice they have to pick up a grab bag and leave… look for food, look for water, look for shelter, but turn up at work each day.”

With the Israeli military operation getting closer, the doctors are also prepared to evacuate at short notice.

Essential supplies have been gathered and packed ready in a storeroom.

But Nasser hospital has the last remaining ICU department in the whole of southern Gaza – one of only two with a working oxygen supply. If it must be evacuated, then the remaining temporary field hospitals would likely be overwhelmed and unable to cope.

A medical student who lost all four limbs due to sepsis has called on people to get the meningitis vaccine to help prevent them going through a similar ordeal.

Lily McGarry was rushed to the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff with flu-like symptoms in January before her condition rapidly worsened and she went into septic shock.

The 23-year-old was diagnosed with meningococcal septicaemia, a type of blood poisoning caused by the same kind of bacteria that causes the most common form of bacterial meningitis.

Ms McGarry, who is originally from Jersey but was studying in Cardiff, survived two cardiac arrests before spending a fortnight in a coma and more than 100 days in intensive care.

The infection caused severe blood flow issues in her body and, as a result, she had to undergo surgery to amputate all four of her limbs at the Morriston Hospital in Swansea.

As the Cardiff University student begins her rehabilitation, her father Stuart McGarry told The UK Tonight with Sarah-Jane Mee his daughter now wants people to have the meningitis vaccine to help prevent protect them against meningococcal septicaemia.

Mr McGarry said: “(Lily) wants to get the message out to everyone. The (meningitis) vaccination rate post-COVID for children has dropped off significantly. She just wanted to get the message over to get vaccinated.

“I mean, obviously, Lily proves that it doesn’t work for 100% of the people 100% of the time.

“But the meningitis vaccination programme in the UK has been phenomenally successful… some of the staff at Cardiff hospital hadn’t seen a case like Lily for 10 years. So it’s proven it’s effective. It works. Get it.”

‘Difficult conversations’

Mr McGarry was in Jersey when he received the call from the hospital to say his daughter was unwell.

“It’s the call that no father wants really,” he said.

“They said that I should come over to Cardiff, that Lily was really unwell, and I said, ‘I’ll pack a bag and get a flight tomorrow’ and the nurse said ‘no, you should be here now’.

“Her mum was in Australia when she received the call – so she would have had the flight from hell to come back all the way from Australia to Cardiff.”

Mr McGarry said he later had to have a lot of “very difficult conversations” with NHS staff about what would happen to his daughter’s limbs – with doctors telling him that both of her arms and legs would have to be amputated.

“She’s out of intensive care now after 113 days, she is in the rehabilitation section,” Mr McGarry said.

“The narrative has changed to the body that she has got and what she can do with that.

“I had a wobble for a couple of weeks when I was in front of her and was tearful… she looked me in the eye and she said, ‘Dad, I will make the best of my stumps’.

“And she owned the word ‘stumps’… from that I got a lot of strength because I thought, ‘my God, I think she’s got this’.”

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A GoFundMe account set up to help raise money for prosthetic limbs for Ms McGarry had raised more than £370,000 as of Tuesday night.

Mr McGarry said: “People have been very generous. So there’s that. And that will give Lily that choice down the road.

“At the moment, though, we’re focused more on the present – the small steps… getting her wounds to heal.

“The prosthetics – she’s trying now, with just little ones on her arms, just to give her a little bit more independence, which is something she craves.”

Mr McGarry described his daughter as “a delight”, saying: “We went on a walking holiday in the Swiss Alps last year. She was very happy to go walking around, looking at the wonder and the majesty of the Alps, having a nice gooey Swiss fondue and a couple of pints with her dad – it just doesn’t get better.

“She’s the best person I know. She’s my daughter.”