Australia among 25 countries calling for immediate end to Gaza war

Australia has joined more than two dozen countries in taking a tough stance against Israel, demanding Benjamin Netanyahu put an immediate end to the bloodshed in Gaza.

Australia has joined more than two dozen Western countries calling for an immediate end to the war in Gaza, saying the suffering in the region had “reached new depths”.

After more than 21 months of fighting which have triggered catastrophic humanitarian conditions for Gaza’s more than two million people and following Israel’s military expanding its operations into the central city of Deir el-Balah, Israeli allies Britain, France, Australia, Canada and 21 other countries, plus the EU, said in a joint statement that the war “must end now”.

“The suffering of civilians in Gaza has reached new depths,” the signatories added, urging a negotiated ceasefire, the release of hostages held by Palestinian militants and the free flow of much-needed aid.

This picture taken from a position on the Israeli border with the Gaza Strip, shows smoke billowing during Israeli strikes in the Palestinian territory. Picture: AFP

Smoke billows from Israeli bombardment in Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip. Picture: AFP

Opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Michaelia Cash said it is “disappointing” that the Albanese government has again signed a statement “attacking Israel”.

“It is disappointing that once again the Albanese government is supporting a statement attacking Israel,” Senator Cash said in a statement on X.

“It is important that aid flows into Gaza. Proper quantities of food and other aid must be provided to the people of Gaza. However, the right system must be in place so that it can be distributed without Hamas intervening in the process.”

Smoke and flames erupt from an Israeli airstrike in Gaza. Picture: AP

The plea came as Deir el-Balah came under intense shelling, after Israel’s military warned of imminent action in an area where it had not previously operated.

The military a day earlier had ordered those in the central Gaza area to leave immediately as it was expanding operations, including “in an area where it has not operated before”.

Between 50,000 and 80,000 people were in the area when the evacuation order was issued, according to initial estimates from the UN’s humanitarian agency OCHA.

UK’s foreign secretary David Lammy on Monday repeated the message for the Gaza war to “end now” as hit out at Israel’s aid scheme as being “inhumane” as it “forces desperate civilians, children among them, to scramble unsafely for the essentials of life”.

He said the desperate conditions Gazans have been left in make for a “grotesque spectacle, wrecking a terrible human cost”.

FOLLOW UPDATES BELOW:

ISRAELI ‘SNIPER SOLDIERS’ KILL 93 PEOPLE WAITING FOR AID

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli forces opened fire on crowds of Palestinians trying to collect humanitarian aid in the war-torn Palestinian territory on Sunday, killing 93 people and wounding dozens more.

Eighty were killed as truckloads of aid arrived in the north, while nine others were reported shot near an aid point close to Rafah in the south, where dozens of people lost their lives just 24 hours earlier.

Four were killed near another aid site in Khan Yunis, also in the south, agency spokesman Mahmud Basal told AFP.

Palestinians wounded while trying to reach aid trucks entering northern Gaza through the Zikim crossing with Israel, are brought to Shifa Hospital in Gaza City on Sunday, July 20, 2025. Picture: AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi

Qasem Abu Khater, 36, told AFP he had rushed to the Al-Sudaniya area of Gaza City in the hope of getting a bag of flour, joining a “desperate” crowd of thousands.

“There was deadly overcrowding and pushing - women, men and children,” said Khater, who was displaced from Jabalia, north of the city.

“It felt like we were no longer alive, like we had no souls left. The tanks were firing shells randomly at us and Israeli sniper soldiers were shooting as if they were hunting animals in a forest,” he added.

“Dozens of people were martyred right before my eyes and no one could save anyone.”

Civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that “Israeli forces opened fire on civilians waiting for aid”, and that “dozens” were wounded.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify tolls and details provided by the agency and other parties.

Asked for comment, the military said it was looking into the latest reports of deaths.

The bodies of Palestinians who were killed while attempting to access aid trucks entering northern Gaza through the Zikim crossing with Israel are brought to a clinic in Gaza City, Sunday, July 20, 2025. Picture: AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi

The army has maintained that it works to avoid harm to civilians, saying this month that it issued new instructions to its troops on the ground “following lessons learned” from a spate of similar incidents.

On Sunday, the Israeli military told residents and displaced Palestinians sheltering in the Deir el-Balah area to move south immediately.

Israel was “expanding its activities” against Hamas around Deir el-Balah, “where it has not operated before”, the military’s Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee said on X.

The announcement prompted concern from families of hostages held since October 7, 2023 that the Israeli offensive could harm their loved ones.

They called in a statement for Israeli authorities to “urgently explain to Israeli citizens and families what the fighting plan is and how exactly it protects the abductees who are still in Gaza”.

Palestinians carry sacks of humanitarian aid unloaded from trucks convoy that had been heading to Gaza City, in the northern Gaza Strip Sunday, July 20, 2025. Picture: AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi

Delegations from Israel and militant group Hamas have spent the last two weeks in indirect talks on a proposed 60-day ceasefire in Gaza and the release of 10 living hostages.

Of the 251 hostages taken during Hamas’s 2023 attack, 49 are still being held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.

ISRAELI GUNFIRE KILLS 39 PALESTINIANS SEEKING FOOD

Gaza’s civil defence agency said on Saturday that Israeli fire killed 39 people and wounded more than 100 near two aid centres, in the latest deaths of Palestinians seeking food.

Deaths of people waiting for handouts in huge crowds near food points in Gaza have become a regular occurrence, with the territory’s authorities frequently blaming Israeli fire.

But the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which has replaced UN agencies as the main distributor of aid in the territory, has accused militant group Hamas of fomenting unrest and shooting at civilians.

Civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said the deaths happened near a site southwest of Khan Yunis and another centre northwest of Rafah, both in southern Gaza, attributing the fatalities to “Israeli gunfire”.

Smoke and fire rise to the sky following an Israeli airstrike in the northern Gaza Strip on Friday. Picture: AP

POPE LEO CALLS FOR CEASEFIRE

Pope Leo XIV emphasised the importance of protecting places of worship in a call on Friday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu following Israel’s deadly strike on Gaza’s only Catholic Church, the Vatican said.

The pontiff also renewed his appeal for negotiations, a ceasefire and the end of the war, while reiterating his concern for the “dramatic humanitarian situation” in the Palestinian territory, it said in a statement.

The Vatican said Netanyahu initiated the call, the day after Israeli fire on the Holy Family Church in Gaza City killed three people and provoked international condemnation.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, surrounded by ministers from the government attends a session of the Knesset, Israel's parliament, in Jerusalem. Picture: AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg

“During the conversation, the Holy Father renewed his appeal to revive negotiations and reach a ceasefire and the end of the war,” the Vatican said in a statement, noting that Leo was at his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome.

“He once again expressed his concern for the dramatic humanitarian situation of the population in Gaza, whose heartbreaking toll is borne particularly by children, the elderly and the sick.

“Finally, the Holy Father reiterated the urgency of protecting places of worship and especially the faithful and all people in Palestine and Israel.”

Mr Netanyahu has said Israel “deeply regrets” the strike, and blamed a “stray round”.

Men carry the body of one of two Christian Palestinians, killed earlier in an Israeli strike that hit the Holy Family Church in Gaza City, during their funeral on July 17, 2025. Picture: AFP

He repeated this regret in the conversation with the pope, which was “friendly”, a spokesman for Netanyahu told AFP, adding that the two men agreed to meet soon.

His predecessor, Pope Francis, kept in regular contact with parish priest Father Gabriel Romanelli and repeatedly called for an end to the Gaza war, which has created a humanitarian crisis for the people living there.

Romanelli was one of 10 people injured in the strike and was seen with bandages on his leg.

Meanwhile, two of the most senior Christian leaders in the Holy Land travelled to Gaza on Friday after Israeli fire killed three at the Palestinian territory’s only Catholic church, provoking international condemnation.

Originally published as Australia among 25 countries calling for immediate end to Gaza war