26 EU Countries Call For Immediate Humanitarian Pause In Gaza

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GAZA
TOPSHOT - A Palestinian youth looks for salvageable items amid the rubbe of the Kuhail building which was destroyed in an early morning Israeli airstrike on Gaza City on May 18, 2021. The building had a printshop and university accessories and books storage facility for educational institutes in Gaza as well as a mosque. - The UN Security Council was due to hold an emergency meeting today amid a flurry of urgent diplomacy aimed at stemming Israel air strikes that have killed more than 200 Palestinians. (Photo by MAHMUD HAMS / AFP)

26 EU Countries Call For Immediate Humanitarian Pause In Gaza

 

Twenty-six member states of the European Union (EU) called for an “immediate humanitarian pause that would lead to a sustainable ceasefire” in the besieged Gaza Strip.

The bloc’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said at a meeting of EU foreign ministers that all EU countries except Hungary warned Israel against launching an assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

The EU countries said it would deepen the catastrophe of some 1.5 million refugees crammed into the city.

“An attack on Rafah would be absolutely catastrophic, it would be unconscionable,” Ireland’s Foreign Minister, Micheal Martin, said before the meeting.

Israel’s reported plans for an assault on the city have sounded international alarm bells, with many countries urging restraint or cancelation of the operation.