Please contact your local MP, Foreign Secretary Lord Cameron, and Labour Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy MP – by email and on social media.
You can copy and paste the below message in to your email, or use it to inspire your own message.
Dear [INSERT MP NAME]
I’m writing to ask you to call for the following FIVE urgent steps needed to protect the children of Gaza:
- A #ceasefireNOW as the ONLY way of protecting children and getting them the aid they need.
- The safe access to aid for all children in need, throughout all of Gaza - which also requires the immediate restoration of funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).
- The immediate release of all detainees and hostages held by Israel and Palestinian armed groups.
- There must be accountability for the violations of international humanitarian law and children's rights committed by both Israel and Palestinian armed groups.
- The UK to immediately suspend arms sales to all parties in the conflict, at least for as long as they continue to violate international humanitarian law.
Since attacks by Palestinian armed groups killed around 1,200 Israelis and took around 240 hostages on 7 October, Israeli attacks have killed more than 30,000 people in Gaza, including over 12,500 children. Israeli attacks continue to kill nearly 100 children every day, including growing numbers dying from starvation and dehydration due to restrictions on the amount of aid getting in. Over 900,000 children have been forced from their homes under threat of Israeli violence. More than 600,000 are currently sheltering in the town of Rafah as a last resort; yet even Rafah is now being subjected to Israeli attacks. The children of Gaza have nowhere left to go.
Forced displacement and collective punishment (including through the use of starvation as a weapon of war) are violations of international humanitarian law (IHL), and authorities such as the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights have declared that BOTH the Israeli government and the Palestinian armed groups that carried out the 7 October attacks are guilty of war crimes. Failing to call these violations out, and continuing to sell arms to Israel, makes the UK complicit.
The motion that parliament voted for on 21 February is wholly inadequate due to the conditions and caveats it places on a ceasefire, and as it makes no reference to the violations of child rights and international law currently being committed. Disputes over parliamentary process also effectively made the vote invalid.
The UK retains considerable influence on global affairs, and it is essential that we push for all five of the points above if we want to protect the children caught up in this conflict, and help uphold humanitarian law and child rights on the global stage. History will judge the UK and all our politicians on how they respond to this crisis.
Yours,
[INSERT YOUR NAME AND ADDRESS]
Donate to children in Gaza
Children in Gaza are living through an unprecedented crisis. Relentless bombing, fighting and destruction has left tens of thousands of children homeless, injured, and terrified for their lives. War Child staff and partners are doing everything they can to support families but supplies in Gaza are extremely limited and there’s nowhere near enough to go around. A donation from you could help provide hygiene kits, mental health support and warm clothes. The needs of children will be huge, and we can’t do it without you.
