As I write this, we are still coming to terms with the news of the bombing of al-Ahli hospital in Gaza City, with hundreds already declared dead, and the number still increasing. The horror of the scenes is indescribable. Journalists on site, even the most seasoned after reporting on so many Israeli attacks in Gaza, are visibly distraught live on air, finding themselves unable to put words to what they are seeing.

All week, as Israeli bombs have rained down on the besieged Gaza Strip, we have been saying, “this is bound to get worse than we’ve ever seen.” Although the scale of violence is unprecedented, we know the wide range of Israel’s destructive capabilities — its powerful arsenal of weapons, some of which are partly manufactured on British soil; the cruel calculations made by Israeli military strategists; the grotesque propaganda that the Israeli government churns out to justify its brutal attacks and to whip up warmongering governments internationally to come to its support.

Israel is responsible for these crimes, but others are complicit. Here in Britain, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak responded to a question about the targeting of civilians and the cutting of fuel, water, and medical supplies to Gaza’s 2.3 million inhabitants, by insisting “that the responsibility for what is happening here is with Hamas and Hamas alone.” Opposition Labour leader Keir Starmer has repeatedly made similar statements. By denying that Israel is responsible even for its own actions, they have given a green light to attacks on civilians, like the one on al-Ahli hospital, to be carried out with impunity.