Rishi Sunak is facing calls for the UK to recognise the state of Palestine, on the day that Ireland, Spain and Norway officially do so.
The Scottish first minister and Scottish National Party (SNP) leader John Swinney has written to both the prime minister and Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer urging them to “do the right thing” and “immediately” recognise a Palestinian state.
He said the SNP would force a binding vote at Westminster after the general election if they failed to do so.
Mr Swinney said recognition would offer “hope” that a “durable political solution” was possible between Israel and Palestine.
“I am calling on the UK to follow the lead of Ireland, Norway and Spain by immediately recognising Palestine as a state – and if Rishi Sunak will not do it now, Keir Starmer must commit to doing so on his first day in Downing Street.”
The Palestinian ambassador to Ireland has also urged the UK government to recognise Palestine.
Image: An Israeli soldier sits in a tank near the Israel-Gaza border. Pic: Reuters
Speaking to Sky News, Dr Jilan Wahba Abdalmajid said: “The British have a very strong hand in the injustice that happened to the Palestinians, so I think it’s important that one of those countries that should recognise the right of Palestinian self-determination is the British government.”
Dr Abdalmajid referred to Britain’s involvement in the establishment of the state of Israel, including the 1917 Balfour Declaration, in which the British government of David Lloyd George announced its support for a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine.
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“Justice must prevail,” said the ambassador. “I think it’s very important for the British government to see this and try to correct what happened in 1917, and during the Mandate when they encouraged colonisation in Palestine.”
Their ambassadors have been formally reprimanded by Tel Aviv, and were filmed by Israeli media as they were asked to watch video footage from the 7 October Hamas attack, something the Irish government deems “unacceptable”.
The Israeli foreign minister, Israel Katz, posted a video on X showing footage of Hamas militants interspersed with traditional Irish music, footage of Irish dancing and the slogan “Hamas: Thanks Ireland”.
Similar videos, tailored to Spain and Norway, were also posted.
Image: A Palestinian boy sits on debris after an Israeli strike on a house in Rafah on 9 May. Pic: Reuters
Addressing the taoiseach, Mr Katz wrote: “Ireland, if your goal was to reward terrorism by declaring support for a Palestinian state, you’ve achieved it. [Irish Prime Minister] Simon Harris, Hamas thanks you for your service.”
It’s a point of view firmly rejected by the Irish. Speaking in Brussels with his counterparts from Spain and Norway, the Irish foreign minister Micheal Martin said: “Some have framed our decision to recognise the State of Palestine as a move to impose an outcome on the parties, or as somehow a reward for terror.
“Nothing could be further from the truth. We have recognised both the State of Israel and the State of Palestine precisely because we want to see a future of normalised relations between the two peoples.”
But members of Ireland’s small Jewish community are sceptical. Former justice minister Alan Shatter told Sky News the move was political theatre.
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“It’s about as relevant as New Zealand announcing that they now recognise that the government of the Republic of Ireland rules the entirety of the island of Ireland,” he said.
“Of course, that wouldn’t change the reality on the ground. And probably if that did happen, the Irish government would look askance and think everyone in New Zealand has gone mad.”
Others say they fear the move could fuel anti-semitism. Maurice Cohen, chairman of the Jewish Representative Council of Ireland, said that “latent anti-semitism is now becoming blatant anti-semitism”.
“The experience [for Jews in Ireland] has always been ‘cead mile failte’ [‘a hundred thousand welcomes’]. There was an outstretched hand for us and for other people.
“But now we find, very simply, that that hand is curling into a fist and we don’t know where that is going.”
Palestinians in Ireland are expected to gather outside Leinster House, the home of the Irish parliament, today as speeches are made.
“This gives them hope,” said Dr Abdaljamid. “This gives them some light after this dark tunnel.
“The Palestinian people see that we are seen, we are heard by Ireland, by Spain, by the whole world actually who protest since the 7th of October. We are not alone in this world. I mean it’s very important.”
A large-scale Russian attack through the night into Sunday injured at least 11 in Kyiv and killed three people in towns surrounding the capital.
There were attacks elsewhere as well, including drone strikes in Mykolaiv, where a residential building was hit.
Image: An apartment building destroyed after a Russian attack in Mykolaiv. Pic: State Emergency Service of Ukraine
‘Massive’ attack
In Kyiv, the city’s administration warned “the night will be difficult”, as people were urged to remain in shelters.
The city’s mayor Vitaliy Klitschko described it as a “massive” attack.
He said: “Explosions in the city. Air defence forces are working. The capital is under attack by enemy UAVs. Do not neglect your safety! Stay in shelters!”
It came after at least 15 people were injured in attacks the night prior.
Russia claimed it also faced a Ukrainian drone attack on Sunday, and that it intercepted and destroyed around 100 of them near Moscow and across Russia’s central and southern regions.
Image: A municipality worker cleans up after a Russian drone strike on Kyiv. Pic: Reuters
Russia ‘dragging out the war’
Meanwhile, Russia and Ukraine continued a prisoner exchange, marking a rare moment of cooperation in the war.
Amid the most recent attacks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy repeated his calls for sanctions on Russia.
Russia “fills each day with horror and murder” and is “simply dragging out the war”, he said.
Image: A resident looks at an apartment building that was damaged in a Russian drone strike. Pic: Reuters
“All of this demands a response – a strong response from the United States, from Europe, and from everyone in the world who wants this war to end,” Mr Zelenskyy added.
Every day “gives new grounds for sanctions against Russia”, he said, and each day without pressure proves the “war will continue”.
Ukraine, meanwhile, is ready for “any form of diplomacy that delivers real results”.
Nine of a doctor’s 10 children have been killed in an Israeli missile strike on their home in Gaza, which also left her surviving son badly injured and her husband in a critical condition.
Warning: This article contains details of child deaths
Alaa Al Najjar, a paediatrician at Al Tahrir Clinic in the Nasser Medical Complex, was at work during the attack on her home, south of the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, on Friday.
Graphic footage shared by the Hamas-run Palestinian Civil Defence shows the bodies of at least seven small children being pulled from the rubble.
Rescuers can be seen battling fires and searching through a collapsed building, shouting out when they locate a body, before bringing the children out one by one and wrapping their remains in body bags.
In the footage, Dr Al Najjar’s husband, Hamdi Al Najjar, who is also a doctor, is put on to a stretcher and then carried to an ambulance.
The oldest of their children was only 12 years old, according to Dr Muneer Alboursh, the director general of Gaza’s health ministry, which is run by Hamas.
Image: Nine children were killed in the strike. Pic: Palestinian Civil Defence
“This is the reality our medical staff in Gaza endure. Words fall short in describing the pain,” he wrote in a social media post.
“In Gaza, it is not only healthcare workers who are targeted – Israel’s aggression goes further, wiping out entire families.”
Image: Pic: Palestinian Civil Defence
British doctors describe ‘horrific’ and ‘unimaginable’ attack
Two British doctors working at Nasser Hospital described the attack as “horrific” and “unimaginable” for Dr Al Najjar.
Speaking in a video diary on Friday night, Dr Graeme Groom said his last patient of the day was Dr Al Najjar’s 11-year-old son, who was badly injured and “seemed much younger as we lifted him on to the operating table”.
Image: Hamdi Al Najjar, Dr Al Najjar’s husband who is also a doctor, was taken to hospital. Pic: Palestinian Civil Defence
The strike “may or may not have been aimed at his father”, Dr Groom said, adding that the man had been left “very badly injured”.
Dr Victoria Rose said the family “lived opposite a petrol station, so I don’t know whether the bomb set off some massive fire”.
Image: Pic: Palestinian Civil Defence
‘No political or military connections’
Dr Groom added: “It is unimaginable for that poor woman, both of them are doctors here.
“The father was a physician at Nasser Hospital. He had no political and no military connections. He doesn’t seem to be prominent on social media, and yet his poor wife is the only uninjured one, who has the prospect of losing her husband.”
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2:21
Nineteen of Gaza’s hospitals remain operational, all of them are overwhelmed with the number of patients and a lack of supplies
He said it was “a particularly sad day”, while Dr Rose added: “That is life in Gaza. That is the way it goes in Gaza.”
Sky News has approached the Israeli Defence Forces for comment.
Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza began when the militant group stormed across the border into Israel on 7 October 2023, killing some 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and abducting 251 others.
Israel’s military response has flattened large areas of Gaza and killed more than 53,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count.
The head of the UN has said Israel has only authorised for Gaza what amounts to a “teaspoon” of aid after at least 60 people died in overnight airstrikes.
UN secretary general Antonio Guterres said on Friday the supplies approved so far “amounts to a teaspoon of aid when a flood of assistance is required,” adding “the needs are massive and the obstacles are staggering”.
He warned that more people will die unless there is “rapid, reliable, safe and sustained aid access”.
Image: A woman at the site of an Israeli strike in Jabalia, northern Gaza. Pic: Reuters
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Gaza: ‘Loads of children with huge burns’
Israel says around 300 aid trucks have been allowed through since it lifted an 11-week blockade on Monday, but according to Mr Guterres, only about a third have been transported to warehouses within Gaza due to insecurity.
The IDF said 107 vehicles carrying flour, food, medical equipment and drugs were allowed through on Thursday.
Many of Gaza’s two million residents are at high risk of famine, experts have warned.
Meanwhile, at least 60 people have been killed by Israeli airstrikes across Gaza overnight.
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Ten people died in the southern city of Khan Younis, and deaths were also reported in the central town of Deir al-Balah and the Jabaliya refugee camp in the north, according to the Nasser, Al-Aqsa and Al-Ahli hospitals where the bodies were brought.
Image: A body is carried out of rubble after an Israeli strike in Jabalia, northern Gaza. Pic: Reuters
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‘Almost everyone depends on aid’ in Gaza
The latest strikes came a day after two Israeli embassy workers were killed in Washington.
The suspect, named as 31-year-old Elias Rodriguez from Chicago, Illinois, told police he “did it for Gaza”.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Sir Keir Starmer, Emmanuel Macron and Mark Carney of fuelling antisemitism following the shootings.
Mr Netanyahu also accused Sir Keir, Mr Macron and Mr Carney of siding with “mass murderers, rapists, baby killers and kidnappers”.
Image: Palestinians search for casualties in Jabalia, northern Gaza. Pic: Reuters
But UK government minister Luke Pollard told Sky News on Friday morning he “doesn’t recognise” Mr Netanyahu’s accusation.
Earlier this week, Mr Netanyahu said he was recalling negotiators from the Qatari capital, Doha, after a week of ceasefire talks failed to bring results. A working team will remain.
The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on 7 October 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping 251 others.
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The militants are still holding 58 captives, around a third of whom are believed to be alive, after most of the rest were returned in ceasefire agreements or other deals.
Israel’s offensive, which has destroyed large swaths of Gaza, has killed more than 53,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry.