Category: 2. World

United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov for a second time in two days on Friday, with the war in Ukraine the focal point of their huddle. They had met for 50 minutes on the sidelines of the ASEAN summit in Malaysia on Thursday.

While campaigning for re-election, US President Donald Trump had promised to end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours of taking office.

But more than four months later, the prospects of a ceasefire appear as remote as ever, with Russia launching a fierce bombardment of Ukraine in recent days.

After the Thursday meeting, Rubio told reporters that Trump was  “disappointed and frustrated that there’s not been more flexibility on the Russian side” to bring an end to the war in Ukraine.

So has Trump’s view of the war changed – and what are his next options?

Has Trump’s position on Russia shifted?

Rubio’s comments come at a time when Trump has increasingly been publicly critical of Putin, after previously accusing Ukraine of not wanting peace.

“We get a lot of b******t thrown at us by Putin. He’s very nice all the time, but it turns out to be meaningless,” Trump said on Tuesday.

Since February, the US has held separate talks with Russia and Ukraine, and brokered direct talks between them in May in Istanbul for the first time since the early months of Russia’s full-fledged invasion in 2022.

But while Putin has offered brief pauses in fighting, he has not accepted the US proposal for an unconditional 30-day ceasefire. Ukraine has accepted that proposal. Russia argues that Ukraine could use the truce to remobilise troops and rearm itself.

When asked by reporters this week whether he would act on his frustration with Putin, Trump responded: “I wouldn’t be telling you. Don’t we want to have a little surprise?”

However, experts caution against concluding that Trump was ready to act tough against Russia.

“Western media is full of commentary on what it calls Trump‘s ‘changing stance’ on Putin. But as yet, there is no reason to think that anything has changed at all,” Keir Giles, a senior consulting fellow at the London-based Chatham House think tank, told Al Jazeera.

“There is a wave of optimism across the world that this might finally lead to a change in US policy. But, on every previous occasion, this has not happened.”

Indeed, after the Thursday meeting between Rubio and Lavrov, both sides suggested that they were willing to continue to engage diplomatically.

Arming Ukraine to fight off Russia

In early July, the Trump administration announced a decision to “pause” arms supply to Kyiv. A week later, he reversed this decision.

“We’re going to send some more weapons. We have to. They have to be able to defend themselves. They are getting hit very hard now,” said Trump on July 8.

On Thursday, Trump told NBC that these weapons would be sold to NATO, which will pay fully for them. NATO will then pass them on to Ukraine.

“We’re sending weapons to NATO, and NATO is paying for those weapons, a hundred percent,” Trump told NBC, adding that the US will be sending Patriot missiles to the alliance.

Trump said this deal was agreed on during the NATO summit in The Hague in June.

Trump had also frozen aid to Ukraine in February, after a falling out with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy following a rancorous meeting in the White House. Trump accused Zelenskyy of talking the US into “spending $350 Billion Dollars, to go into a War that couldn’t be won”.

Trump resumed the supplies weeks later. Between January 2022 and April 2025, the US has provided Ukraine with about $134bn in aid, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.

Trump’s MAGA [Make America Great Again] base has been critical of the funding that the US provides Ukraine.

Following Trump’s announcement that the US will resume sending weapons to Ukraine, several conservative Americans have responded with disappointment.

“I did not vote for this,” wrote Derrick Evans on X on July 8. Evans was one of Trump’s supporters who stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 and was arrested, to be pardoned by Trump in January this year.

Conservative social media duo Keith and Kevin Hodge wrote on X on July 8: “Who in the hell is telling Trump that we need to send more weapons to Ukraine?”

Sanctioning Russia

When asked on July 8 about his interest in a Congress bill proposing additional sanctions on Russia, Trump responded, “I’m looking at it very strongly.”

Since the war in Ukraine started in 2022, the US and its allies have imposed at least 21,692 sanctions on Russian individuals, media organisations, and institutions across sectors such as the military, energy, aviation, shipbuilding and telecommunications.

However, while these sanctions have hit Russia’s economy, it has not collapsed the way some experts had predicted it would in the early months of the war.

In recent months, Zelenskyy has repeatedly requested his allies in the West to tighten sanctions on Russia, to put pressure on Putin to end the war.

Most recently, Zelenskyy posted on X on Friday following a Russian drone attack in Kharkiv: “Sanctions must be strengthened. We are expecting the adoption of a new sanctions package. Everything that will put pressure on Russia and stop it must be implemented as quickly as possible.”

A bipartisan Senate bill sponsored by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham aims to levy tariffs on countries that import oil, gas and uranium from Russia.

In 2023, crude petroleum, petroleum gas and refined petroleum constituted nearly 54 percent of total Russian exports, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC).

According to the OEC, China and India buy a bulk of Russia’s oil and gas products.

In 2024, Russian oil accounted for 35 percent of India’s total crude imports and 19 percent of China’s oil imports. Turkiye also imports Russian oil, with as much as 58 percent of its refined petroleum imports sourced from Russia in 2023.

But the West has not weaned itself off Russia, either.

In 2024, European countries paid more than $700m to buy Russian uranium products, according to an analysis by Brussels-based think tank Bruegel, based on data from the European Union’s statistical office, Eurostat.

In late March this year, Trump expressed anger with Putin and threatened “secondary tariffs” on any country that buys Russian oil if a ceasefire deal is not reached, but these tariffs were not imposed.

“If a new sanctions bill does pass, and the United States does impose costs on Moscow for the first time during the current administration, this would be a radical departure from Trump’s consistent policy,” Giles said.

“It remains to be seen whether Trump will in fact allow this, or whether his deference to Putin will mean he continues to resist any possible countermeasures against Moscow.”

Walking away from the conflict

On April 18, US Secretary of State Rubio said his country might “move on” from the Russia-Ukraine war if a ceasefire deal is not brokered.

“We are now reaching a point where we need to decide whether this is even possible or not,” Rubio told reporters in Paris after talks between American, Ukrainian and European officials.

“Because if it’s not, then I think we’re just going to move on. It’s not our war. We have other priorities to focus on,” Rubio continued.

On the same day, Trump echoed Rubio’s statements to reporters. However, Trump did not say that he is ready to walk away from peace negotiations.

“Well, I don’t want to say that, but we want to see it end,” Trump said.

More diplomacy

The second day of talks between Rubio and Lavrov, however, suggests that the US has not given up on diplomacy yet.

Rubio told reporters on Thursday that the US and Russia have exchanged new ideas for peace in Ukraine. “I think it’s a new and a different approach,” Rubio said, without offering any details of what the “new approach” involved.

“I wouldn’t characterise it as something that guarantees a peace, but it’s a concept that, you know, that I’ll take back to the president,” Rubio added.

Following Rubio and Lavrov’s meeting on Thursday, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a news release that the US and Russia had “a substantive and frank exchange of views on the settlement in Ukraine” and will continue constructive dialogue.

The statement added: “[Russia and the US] have reaffirmed mutual commitment to searching for peaceful solutions to conflict situations and resuming Russian-US economic and humanitarian cooperation.”

In the Georgian highland village of Ghorjomi, Friday prayers in the local mosque are always packed, says imam Tamaz Gorgadze.

Tucked away in the remote valleys close to the Turkish border, Ghorjomi – and the surrounding region of Upper Adjara – are a rare outpost of Islam in one of the world’s most devoutly Christian countries.

“We live in Georgia, a multi-confessional country,” he told Reuters in June, after prayers for the Eid ul-Adha religious festival.

Georgia was the second country in the world to adopt Christianity as its state religion around the year 319, behind only neighbouring Armenia.

It remains devoutly Christian, and national identity closely linked to centuries of struggle against Muslim Persian and Turkic invaders.

Still today, Adjara’s Muslim Georgians are derisively dubbed “Tatars” by some, referring to a Muslim ethnic group in Russia.

According to census data, around 10% of Georgia’s 3.6 million people are Muslims. The bulk of them belong to the mostly Shi’ite Azerbaijani minority.

But ethnically Georgian Muslims, unique to Adjara, are rarer and more controversial in a country whose national flag consists of five Christian crosses.

The country’s powerful Orthodox Church is seen as a custodian of Georgian identity, and for many, membership of the church is a prerequisite for being truly Georgian.

However, for the Georgians of Upper Adjara, who were converted to Islam during centuries spent as part of the Ottoman Empire, there is nothing contradictory in being both a practicing Muslim and a patriotic Georgian.

“We are proud that we are Georgians. We have a shared past,” said Tariel Nakaidze, a Ghorjomi native and head of the Georgian Muslims Union.

Nevertheless, said Nakaidze, Georgian Muslims experience social pressures he likened to anti-religious campaigns under the Soviet Union.

He said: “During the Soviet Union in Georgia, both Christians and Muslims had to live a double life. On the outside, you were an atheist. But at home, you were a believer.”

“Unfortunately, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, that problem was replaced by the Orthodox Christian religion.”

Adjaran Islam comes with a distinctly Georgian flavours. Central to local Muslim life are Adjara’s distinctive wooden mosques.

Their outsides sheathed in corrugated iron to protect from mountain winters, on the inside Adjaran mosques feature intricate wooden carvings, vividly painted in a medley of traditional Ottoman and Georgian designs.

Down on the Black Sea coast, 100km [62 miles] from Ghorjomi, sits Batumi, Adjara’s capital and Georgia’s second city.

A raucous seaside resort town with casinos and night clubs catering mostly to tourists from the former Soviet Union, Batumi’s mosque congregations are swollen by visitors from across the Turkish border, 20km [12 miles) away, as well as by Middle Eastern tourists.

Space is so limited that worshippers are often forced to pray on the street outside.

Batumi imam Tamaz Geladze has been trying to expand his rudimentary, lean-to mosque for years. Though permission has been granted by the authorities, the project remains tied up in bureaucracy.

Even so, Geladze said he valued Georgia’s history of tolerance towards religious minorities.

“We have coexisted for centuries here, in friendship and in dialogue.”

“Georgia’s diversity is a treasure,” he added.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s trip to Washington this week netted U.S. President Donald Trump another nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize he covets, but the ceasefire the U.S. leader sought for the war in Gaza didn’t emerge.

Despite Mr. Trump throwing his weight behind a push for a 60-day truce between Israel and Hamas, no breakthrough was announced during Mr. Netanyahu’s visit, a disappointment for a president who wants to be known as a peacemaker and has hinged his reputation on being a dealmaker.

“He prides himself or being able to make deals, so this is another test case,” said Rachel Brandenburg, the Israel Policy Forum’s Washington managing director and senior fellow.

Trump’s ability to strike a ceasefire deal in the 21-month war will reveal the boundaries of his influence with Netanyahu, especially after their recent joint strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities that both leaders touted at the White House this week.

Beyond the back-to-back meetings Mr. Trump and Mr. Netanyahu had at the White House this week, there was little public evidence of progress at a time when the Republican U.S. president is pushing to end the fighting.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Thursday that when it comes to a ceasefire in Gaza, “we’re closer than we’ve been in quite a while and we’re hopeful, but we also recognize there’s still some challenges in the way.”

Rubio, who spoke to reporters while traveling in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, also said that Trump “wants to see a ceasefire and we’ve invested a lot of time and energy.”

Beyond ending the bloodshed, ending the war in Gaza would give Trump more leeway to strike some of the broader agreements he seeks in the Middle East, such as expanding the Abraham Accords that started in his first term and normalising relations with Syria’s new government.

“He wants to be the one who gets hostages home and sees the war in Gaza end so he can move on to some of these bigger deals,” Brandenburg said.

Even if a truce is reached, Netanyahu has promised fighting will continue if necessary until Hamas is destroyed. The militant group, meanwhile, has conditioned the release of the remaining hostages on Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza, a stipulation Israel has been unwilling to accept.

It’s unclear how much pressure Mr. Trump put on Mr. Netanyahu in their private talks this week. But the two leaders came into the visit seeming more aligned than ever — at least for now — fresh off the president having twice come to the Israeli leader’s assistance.

Mr. Trump made the risky move to join Israel’s attacks on Iran last month, delivering pivotal U.S. firepower while alarming world leaders and some of Trump’s “America first” supporters. Mr. Trump also inserted himself into Israel’s domestic affairs, calling for Netanyahu’s yearslong corruption trial to be thrown out.

That’s a marked turnaround in their relationship, which had appeared somewhat strained in recent years.

Mr. Trump shocked some of his fellow Republicans and staunch supporters of Israel by publicly criticising Netanyahu not long after Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, setting off the conflict.

He said that Netanyahu “was not prepared” for the attack from Hamas and that Netanyahu had “let us down” just before the U.S. killed top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani in 2020.

Even during his last visit to the White House earlier this year, Mr. Netanyahu seemed caught off guard when Mr. Trump announced the U.S. would hold talks with Iran over its nuclear deal rather than embrace Mr. Netanyahu’s push for military pressure.

With their military objectives aligning for a time on Iran, the Israeli leader has worked to foster a warmer relationship.

In a video he released after the U.S. strikes, Netanyahu spoke — in English instead of Hebrew — of the “unshakeable alliance” between their countries while repeatedly praising Trump.

“His leadership today has created a pivot of history that can help lead the Middle East and beyond to a future of prosperity and peace,” Mr. Netanyahu said.

In his visit to Washington this week, the Israeli leader also showed he knows how to praise the president in a way that matters greatly to him when he unveiled a letter in front of reporters and cameras to announce he had nominated him for a Nobel Peace Prize.

Those gestures, though, may only carry him so far as Mr. Trump pushes for a deal that Mr. Netanyahu may not be able to accept.

“I think if Netanyahu stands in the way too much for too long of the sort of loftier objectives Trump has set out for himself,” Brandenburg said, “Netanyahu will be cast aside as more of a problem than an asset.”

Mr. Netanyahu, like many Israelis, believes Mr. Trump is the greatest friend they have ever had in the White House and is deeply grateful for the U.S. strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites last month.

But the Israeli leader is also under mounting public pressure to end the war as hostages languish in captivity and more Israeli soldiers are killed in guerrilla-style attacks.

Israel’s military success against Iran has given him some political capital, but if he ends the war while leaving Hamas intact, he will have broken his repeated promise of “total victory.”

His far-right coalition partners have threatened to bolt if he does that, sparking early elections that could end his nearly unbroken 16 years in power and leave him more vulnerable to long-standing corruption charges.

Published – July 11, 2025 06:29 pm IST

Reuters

Anadolu via Getty Images

Reuters

At least 798 people have been killed in Gaza since late May while attempting to receive food aid, the United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR) said.

“Up until the seventh of July, we’ve recorded now 798 killings, including 615 in the vicinity of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation sites, and 183 presumably on the route of aid convoys,” OHCHR spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani told reporters in Geneva, according to Reuters.

Meanwhile, at least eight Palestinians were killed on Friday in an Israeli air strike on a school sheltering displaced families in northern Gaza, said local medical sources.

The strike targeted the school in an area where many civilians had sought refuge from ongoing military operations, according to Al Jazeera Arabic. The report, citing a source at Al-Shifa Hospital, added that several others were wounded in the attack.

A beam of light is seen resulting from an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the Israel-Gaza border on July 10, 2025. — Reuters

UNRWA calls Gaza ‘graveyard of children and starving people’

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has described Gaza as a “graveyard of children and starving people,” highlighting the dire humanitarian situation.

In a post on social media platform X, UNRWA said, “No way out. Their choice is between two deaths: starvation or being shot at.”

The agency condemned what it called a “cruel and Machiavellian scheme” killing Palestinians and warned that “our norms and values are being buried.”

UNRWA urged urgent action, stating, “Inaction will bring more chaos. Time to act is overdue.”

Ceasefire talks

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has, for the first time, publicly stated that Israel is seeking an end to the war in Gaza — but only under conditions set by Israel, Al Jazeera reported.

Excavators enter Gaza, on the Israel-Gaza border, as seen from the Israeli side of the Israel-Gaza border on July 10, 2025. — Reuters

Speaking in Washington, Netanyahu said Israel is prepared to enter a 60-day temporary ceasefire and begin negotiations for a permanent resolution. However, he listed three “minimal requirements” for any lasting end to the conflict.

These include a complete disarmament of Hamas, the group’s full military and political dismantlement, and its removal from any future role in Gaza.

Beams of light are seen from the Israeli side of the Israel-Gaza border on July 10, 2025. — Reuters

Netanyahu warned that if Israel’s demands are not met during the ceasefire period, military operations would resume. “One way or another, Israel is going to achieve its objectives,” he said.

Smoke and flames from an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the Israel-Gaza border on July 10, 2025. — Reuters

MSF evacuates Gaza clinic as Israeli forces advance in Khan Younis

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said on Wednesday it was forced to evacuate one of its clinics in western Khan Younis and suspend operations at another, as Israeli forces advanced into the densely populated area of southern Gaza.

In a statement posted on X, the medical charity said tanks came within 100 metres of the al-Attar clinic, and the surrounding area was hit by gunfire, drones, and airstrikes, forcing staff and patients to flee.

“The quadcopter and military vehicles near the clinic were firing. Several bullets penetrated the facility. Then we heard multiple explosions around the clinic, and shrapnel hit the building,” said Rami Abu Anza, MSF’s nursing team supervisor.

The advance pushed thousands of displaced people into a shrinking coastal area, MSF added, describing conditions as increasingly perilous.

MSF also reported that its al-Mawasi clinic was struggling to function. It received two critically injured boys who had been shot near the GHF aid distribution point in Rafah. Staff were unable to transfer them to nearby hospitals due to ongoing hostilities and overcrowding at medical facilities.

‘Counterterrorism’ operations in occupied West Bank

Separately, Israeli Army Chief of Staff Lieutenant-General Eyal Zamir visited the site of an attack in the Israeli settlement of Gush Etzion on Thursday night and vowed to escalate counterterrorism operations in the occupied West Bank.

Israeli security personnel stand guard near the scene of a stabbing attack in Gush Etzion in the occupied West Bank on July 10, 2025 [Ammar Awad/Reuters]

Earlier in the day, a Palestinian carried out a combined stabbing and shooting attack, killing one Israeli before being shot dead by security forces, the Israeli military said.

The statement quoted Zamir as describing the incident as a “grave terror attack” and expressing condolences for the victim’s family.

He also praised the security forces for preventing what he said could have been a “larger and more severe” assault.

“We will continue intense counterterrorism activity wherever necessary,” Zamir said, referring to ongoing operations across the West Bank.

Israel’s war on Gaza

The Israeli army has launched a brutal offensive against Gaza since October 2023, killing at least 57,481 Palestinians, including 134,592 children. More than 111,588 people have been injured, and over 14,222 are missing and presumed dead.

Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave. The proposed deal includes a pause in hostilities, increased humanitarian aid, and negotiations on the release of captives.

For Gazans, a 60-day ceasefire being negotiated between Israel and Hamas would be a lifeline.

A window to bring in large quantities of desperately needed food, water and medicine after severe – and at times total – Israeli restrictions on aid deliveries.

But for Israel’s defence minister Israel Katz a two-month pause in military operations would create an opportunity to build what he has called a “humanitarian city” in the ruins of the southern city of Rafah to contain almost every single Gazan except those belonging to armed groups.

According to the plan, Palestinians would be security screened before being allowed in and not permitted to leave.

Critics, both domestically and internationally, have condemned the proposal, with human rights groups, academics and lawyers calling it a blueprint for a “concentration camp”.

It’s unclear to what extent it represents a concrete plan of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government or whether it is a negotiating tactic to put more pressure on Hamas in the talks on a ceasefire and hostage release deal.

In the notable absence of any Israeli plan for Gaza after the war ends, this idea is filling the strategic vacuum.

Katz briefed a group of Israeli reporters that the new camp would initially house about 600,000 Palestinians – and eventually the whole 2.1 million population.

His plan would see the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) securing the site from a distance while international bodies managed the area. Four aid distribution sites would be established in the area, he said.

Katz also restated his desire to encourage Palestinians to “voluntarily emigrate” from the Gaza to other countries.

But it has not gained traction or support among other senior figures in Israel, and according to reports the proposal even triggered a clash between the prime minister and the head of the IDF.

Israeli media say the office of the chief of the general staff, Lt Gen Eyal Zamir, made clear the army was not obligated to forcibly transfer civilians, as the plan would require.

It’s claimed Gen Zamir and Netanyahu were involved in an angry exchange during a recent war cabinet meeting.

Tal Schneider, a political correspondent at the centrist Times of Israel, said Zamir would be in a strong position to push back because the government “practically begged him to take the job” six months ago – and Netanyahu strongly endorsed his appointment.

It’s not only the top military brass that is opposed to the idea. There is also consternation among rank and file too.

“Any transfer of a civil population is a form of war crime, that’s a form of ethnic cleansing, which is also a form of genocide,” IDF reservist Yotam Vilk told the BBC at his home in Tel Aviv.

The 28-year-old former officer in the Armored Corps is refusing to serve any longer in the army following 270 days of active combat in Gaza.

He describes himself as a patriot and argues Israel must defend itself but that the current war has no strategy nor end in sight.

Vilk is also part of Soldiers for the Hostages, a group calling for an end of the war to secure the release of the 50 Israelis still being held captive by Hamas in Gaza, up to 20 of whom are believed to be alive.

Meanwhile 16 Israeli experts in international law issued a joint letter on Friday denouncing the plan, which they said would constitute a war crime. The letter urged “all relevant parties to publicly withdraw from the plan, renounce it and refrain from carrying it out”.

The plan has unsurprisingly dismayed Palestinians in Gaza.

“We completely reject this proposal, and we reject the displacement of any Palestinian from their land,” Sabreen, who had been forced to leave Khan Younis, told the BBC. “We are steadfast and will remain here until our last breath.”

Ahmad Al Mghayar from Rafah said: “Freedom is above everything. This is our land, we should be free to move wherever we want. Why are we being pressured like this?”

It’s not clear how much support Katz’s plan has among the general public, but recent surveys have indicated the majority of Jews in Israel favour the expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza.

One poll published in the left-wing daily newspaper Haaretz claimed as many as 82 per cent of Jewish Israelis supported such a move.

But there has been curious lack of public support for the proposal among the far-right, including prominent ministers in the coalition Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.

Both have been vocal proponents of Palestinians leaving Gaza and Jewish settlers returning.

Tal Schneider said both ministers may still be weighing up giving their backing to the proposal for a mass camp.

“Maybe they’re waiting to see where the wind blows to see if it’s serious. Both Smotrich and Ben-Gvir are cabinet members and have more access to internal discussions. Maybe they think this is just to put political pressure on Hamas to come to the table.”

Outside Israel, the proposal for a new camp for all Gazans has attracted widespread criticism.

In the UK, minister for the Middle East Hamish Falconer posted on social media that he was “appalled” by the plan.

“Palestinian territory must not be reduced,” he wrote. “Civilians must be able to return to their communities. We need to move towards a ceasefire deal and open a pathway to lasting peace.”

British human rights lawyer Baroness Helena Kennedy KC told the BBC the project would force Palestinians into a “concentration camp”.

The description, which other critics including academics, NGOs and senior UN officials have used, holds considerable resonance in light of the role of concentration camps in the Holocaust.

Baroness Kennedy said the plan – as well as the latest actions of Israel – has led her to conclude Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

“I was very reluctant to go there, because the threshold has to be very high. There has to be specific intent for genocide. But what we’re now seeing is genocidal behaviour,” she said.

Israel has vehemently rejected the charge of genocide and says it does not target civilians.

The Israeli foreign ministry also told the BBC that “the notion that Israel is creating concentration camps is deeply offensive and draws parallels with the Nazis”. Israel “adheres to the Geneva Convention”, it added, referring to the international regulations governing the treatment of civilians in occupied territories.

Aside from grim warnings about what might happen, the prospect of a new camp is having an impact on efforts to end the Gaza war.

Palestinian sources at the ceasefire talks grinding on in the Qatari capital Doha have told the BBC the plan has alarmed the Hamas delegation and has created a new obstacle to a deal.

Additional reporting by Joyce Liu and John Landy