EXCLUSIVE: Yvette Cooper sounds dire Gaza warning as she piles pressure on Israel
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said food and shelter supplies sent by the UK for use in Gaza have been stuck in warehouses for months - warning people cannot wait
People in Gaza cannot afford to wait for aid, the Foreign Secretary has said, as she piled pressure on Israel to lift restrictions on lifesaving supplies.
Yvette Cooper will travel to Jordan on Monday to witness how desperately-needed aid is being held up at the border. She will visit a warehouse stuffed with aid paid for by Britain that is being blocked from entering the war-ravaged strip.
Ahead of the visit, she said: “The people of Gaza cannot afford to wait."
Ms Cooper is pushing to unblock restrictions on vital supplies during a four-day visit to the Middle East - her first to the region as Foreign Secretary. Speaking to the Mirror in Riyadh, in Saudi Arabia, she said: "We've seen man-made famine.
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The Foreign Secretary held talks with her Saudi counterpart, Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan on how to secure long-term peace after the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. She said: "We all know that the ceasefire is still fragile, therefore, what are the things that we need to do and we need other countries to do together to support this process and make sure that we can get a just and lasting peace.
"Both for the UK and for Saudi Arabia, [this] means that belief in the two-state solution, where you can have Israel and Palestine living in peace alongside each other."
Ms Cooper met volunteers at the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre, where they discussed rebuilding Gaza's shattered healthcare system. She also visited the King Abdullah Financial District and met prominent Saudi women for a female-only Majlis, a traditional tea ceremony.
On her visit to Jordan she will announce £6million in funding for life-saving healthcare for women, such as emergency birth kits, as at least 15 women are forced to give birth outside of hospital each week in Gaza. Ms Cooper will meet Jordanian leaders to discuss the ceasefire and efforts to rebuild.
The Foreign Secretary will meet girls at a school and visit a hospital where children were initially treated after being evacuated from Gaza for NHS care in the UK. She will also see training of West-Bank based Palestinian security forces.