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Starmer spoke to his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday and said he was committed to continuing the “vital co-operation” between the two nations to deter malign threats.

On the Israel-Hamas war, Starmer set out the “clear and urgent need for a ceasefire”, the return of hostages and an immediate increase in humanitarian aid to civilians in Gaza.

He stressed the importance of ensuring the long-term conditions for a two-state solution in the region, including that the Palestinian Authority had the “financial means to operate effectively”.
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The UK prime minister also turned to the topic of “ensuring international legitimacy for Palestine” and said that his “long-standing policy on recognition to contribute to a peace process had not changed”, adding that it was the “undeniable right of Palestinians”, according to his statement.
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Three aspects of the Labour administration’s policy on the conflict remain unclear, starting with its assessment of the lawfulness of continuing to license arms exports to Israel.

The second is whether it will reinstate funding for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, which the UK suspended following Israeli claims that some of its staffers belonged to Hamas and had participated in the October 7 attacks.

There is also the question of what the UK will do if the International Criminal Court presses ahead with issuing arrest warrants, for which its chief prosecutor has applied, against Netanyahu and Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant for suspected war crimes in Gaza.

While Lammy said in May that the UK would seek to enforce such warrants if they were granted, Starmer has been more circumspect, commenting that: “I will deal with that when the court has made its decision.”