‘Israel is right to defend itself,’ says Lord Cameron as he blasts Hamas

But the former prime minister also stressed that the UK continued to tell Israel “it has to abide by international humanitarian law”.

However, he added that there was a “fundamental difference” between the two sides, saying: “Whereas Israel uses its defences to try and defend its people, Hamas uses its people to try and defend its rockets.”

Asked whether Israel needed to be “more discriminatory” in its attacks, Lord Cameron said: “We have said right from the start and have said continually that look, we back Israel’s right to defend itself to go after Hamas.

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“This is a murderous terrorist organisation. I saw for myself the terrible things that they did on 7 October. “But we have said that Israel has to have a regard for civilian life, they have to obey international humanitarian law and specifically as they started in the south, not to repeat the tactics in the north.

“We have made those points just as the Americans have and will continue to do so.”

But the foreign secretary appeared to defend Israel’s actions further, adding: “Of course, we want to see pauses so that aid can get in and hostages can get out.

“But if you look at it from Israel’s point of view – or in fact the world’s point of view – if you stop this and Hamas is still in control of part of Gaza, there can’t be the long-term solution that we want.

“[Hamas] is a murderous terrorist organisation that wants to kill as many people as it can, that doesn’t believe in Israel’s right to exist, and it can’t possibly be a partner for peace.”

Questioned about remarks from Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdogan earlier this week, who dubbed Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “war criminal”, Lord Cameron said it was for international bodies to rule on whether war crimes had been committed.

“But there is a fundamental difference,” he said. “They [Hamas] have no regard for civilian casualties, they want as many civilian casualties as possible, so I don’t see there is some sort of moral equivalence between the two.

“Israel has to abide by international humanitarian law and that is the point we keep making to it.”

The US Secretary of State said he believed Israel was taking more steps to protect civilians in their offensive into southern Gaza.

“I said to them very clearly when I was there just a week ago, we cannot have a repeat of what happened in the north in the south in terms of harm being done to civilians,” Mr Blinken said.

“What we’re seeing is areas clearly designated by Israel that are safe areas, where there’s not going to be firing or the military. We’ve seen efforts to make sure that people know that they need to move – and not in the entire city, but just discrete neighborhoods. So that’s positive.”

Lord Cameron is in the United States to hold talks with Joe Biden’s administration about the bloody conflict between Israel and Hamas, and the war in Ukraine.

Since jetting in late on Wednesday night, the new Foreign Secretary has been locked in a series of high level meetings, focusing on the two major military crises affecting the world – and the West’s response to them.

He is set to hold a series of bilateral meetings with Mr Blinken, as well as meeting Republican and Democratic members of Congress.

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