Sadiq Khan has urged the UK government to recognise a Palestinian state immediately, putting more pressure on Keir Starmer to take action as international outcry grows over starvation and killings in Gaza.
Senior government figures have already urged the prime minister in private to recognise Palestine as a way to put pressure on Israel over its repeated killing of desperately hungry civilians in Gaza.
In a statement on X, the Labour mayor of London said the scenes in Gaza were “absolutely harrowing”. He wrote: “Starving children searching hopelessly for food in the rubble. Family members shot dead by Israeli soldiers as they search for aid.
“The international community – including our own government – must do far more to pressure the Israeli government to stop this horrific, senseless killing and let vital, life-saving aid in. Nothing justifies the actions of the Israeli government.
“The UK must immediately recognise Palestinian statehood. There can be no two-state solution if there is no viable state to call Palestine.”
A number of senior ministers are understood to have urged Starmer to give the UK a leading role in recognising a Palestinian state in different cabinet meetings over recent months.
The UK plans to formally acknowledge Palestine as part of a peace process, but only in conjunction with other western countries and “at the point of maximum impact” – without saying when that might be.
There has, however, been a growing sense of horror and despair in the cabinet in recent weeks over Israel’s actions and scenes of looming mass starvation in Gaza.
Speaking in the Commons on Tuesday, the health secretary, Wes Streeting, called for recognition “while there’s still a state of Palestine left to recognise” and condemned Israeli actions that “go well beyond legitimate self-defence”.
Nearly 60 Labour MPs demanded earlier this month that the UK immediately recognise Palestine as a state, after Israel’s defence minister announced plans to force all of Gaza’s residents into a camp in the ruins of Rafah.
Khan’s intervention marks another recent example of the mayor going against Starmer on policy. In June, he urged the government to drop controversial changes to disability benefit, backing rebel Labour MPs who eventually forced the plan to be scuppered.
Khan has won three terms as mayor and is believed to be unlikely to seek another, giving him more leeway to criticise Starmer.
In a joint statement on Wednesday, more than 100 aid organisations said “mass starvation“ was spreading in Gaza as a result of continued Israeli restrictions on how aid arrives and is distributed in the territory.
The 111 signatories, including Doctors Without Borders (MSF), Save the Children and Oxfam, said “our colleagues and those we serve are wasting away”. Israel says aid is being allowed in and accuses Hamas of stealing it.
There have been repeated incidents of civilians being shot while trying to access food from the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an organisation backed by Israel that replaced the UN aid infrastructure in May. The UN says Israeli forces have since killed more than 1,000 Palestinians trying to get food.
The foreign secretary, David Lammy, who said he felt “appalled, sickened” by the scenes of starving Palestinians being shot as they sought food, said the UK would “play its part” in reaching a two-state solution.
