Gaza is now world's biggest 'open-air graveyard' due to Israeli attacks: EU

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell has said that Israel's military campaign in Gaza had turned the territory into the world's biggest "open-air graveyard."

"Gaza was before the war the greatest open-air prison. Today it's the greatest open-air graveyard," Borrell said on Monday at a meeting of EU ministers in Brussels.

"It's a graveyard for tens of thousands of people and also a graveyard for many of the most important principles of humanitarian law."

Borrell also reiterated his accusation that Israel was using famine as a "weapon of war" by not allowing aid trucks into Gaza.

"Israel is provoking famine," he told a humanitarian conference. Israel's Foreign Minister Israel Katz hit back at Borrell and told him to "to stop attacking Israel and recognise our right to self-defence against Hamas' crimes."

"Israel allows extensive humanitarian aid into Gaza by land, air, and sea for anyone willing to help," Katz claimed on X.

EU divided over Israeli war

After the attack on 7 October, the bloodiest war ever erupted in Gaza, in which more than 30,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, were massacred by Israel, and some 1,160 people were killed in Israel, according to an AFP count based on allegations by Israeli officials.

Palestinian resistance groups also seized some 250 hostages, according to Israeli officials, of whom Israel believes that 130 remain in Gaza and including 33 who are presumed dead.

Israel, vowing to destroy Hamas and free the captives, has carried out a relentless bombing campaign and ground assault that Gaza's Health Ministry says has killed at least 31,726 people.

The 27-nation EU has struggled to come up with a united response to the war in Gaza as some members firmly back Israel and others are more pro-Palestinian.

EU ministers were set to discuss a proposal by Ireland and Spain to suspend a cooperation agreement with Israel, but that move was unlikely to get the support of all 27 countries.

The bloc was however expected to agree on sanctions both against Hamas for sexual violence on October 7 according to Israeli claims and against violent Israeli settlers in the West Bank for attacking Palestinians.

Britain and the United States have already imposed sanctions targeting a small number of "extremist" settlers.