UK joins calls for Israel to allow foreign journalists into Gaza

The UK has called on Israel to allow foreign journalists to enter Gaza as Tel Aviv prepares to step up military operations in the territory.

In a statement alongside 25 other members of the Media Freedom Coalition, the UK urged Israel to “allow immediate independent foreign media access and afford protection for journalists operating in Gaza”.

The coalition said: “Journalists and media workers play an essential role in putting the spotlight on the devastating reality of war. Access to conflict zones is vital to carrying out this role effectively.

“We oppose all attempts to restrict press freedom and block entry to journalists during conflicts.

“We also strongly condemn all violence directed against journalists and media workers, especially the extremely high number of fatalities, arrests and detentions.”

Foreign media have been banned from entering Gaza since October 2023, other than for brief, tightly controlled trips escorted by the Israeli military, while numerous Palestinian journalists in the region have been killed.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), 184 journalists and other media workers have been killed by Israeli forces in Gaza since the renewal of hostilities in 2023.

The CPJ has accused Israel of “engaging in the deadliest and most deliberate effort to kill and silence journalists” the organisation had documented.

Israel denies deliberately targeting reporters and has accused some of the journalists killed of being “terrorists”.

The Media Freedom Coalition statement called for attacks on media workers to be investigated and those responsible prosecuted, and reiterated calls for an immediate ceasefire, the release of the remaining Israeli hostages and “unhindered flow of humanitarian aid” into Gaza.

Other signatories alongside the UK included Australia, Germany, Ireland, New Zealand, the Netherlands and Ukraine.

The statement comes a day after Israel called up 60,000 reservists ahead of an expanded military operation in Gaza City, an expansion condemned by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer as “wrong”.

The UK has also condemned Israeli approval, granted on Wednesday, for a settlement project in the occupied West Bank that would effectively cut the territory in two.

Foreign Secretary David Lammy said the E1 settlement plan, which would sever one of the last geographical links between the northern and southern West Bank, would “mark a flagrant breach of international law and critically undermine the two-state solution”.

Meanwhile, the Foreign Office announced sanctions on an Iranian businessman accused of illicitly trading in Russian and Iranian oil.

Hossein Shamkhani, son of one of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei’s top advisers, was added to the UK sanctions list on Thursday along with four companies connected to him.

The move follows the imposition of sanctions on Mr Shamkhani by the United States, which said he used a network of companies to “launder billions in profits from global sales of Iranian and Russian crude oil and other petroleum products”.

US Treasury secretary Scott Bessent said: “The Shamkhani family’s shipping empire highlights how the Iranian regime elites leverage their positions to accrue massive wealth and fund the regime’s dangerous behaviour.”