Ellie Chowns, Green Party MP for North Herefordshire. CC image Wikipedia.
Reacting to Israel’s escalating action in Lebanon, Dr Ellie Chowns MP said:
“Israel’s escalating military campaign in Lebanon has already killed thousands of people, displaced more than a million from their homes, and destroyed vital infrastructure, displaying an indefensible disregard for civilian lives and international law.
“This cannot continue. The UK must put an end to the impunity that has enabled and emboldened the Israeli Government on the world stage. The Green Party repeats our calls for the UK Government to end all arms sales to and military cooperation with Israel, to drive independent investigations into war crimes and support justice mechanisms for victims, and to impose sanctions on Netanyahu and all other government officials responsible for breaches of international law.
“The people of Lebanon – like the people of Palestine, Iran, and Israel – deserve to live in safety and peace, not to have their human rights used as bargaining chips which can be disregarded without consequence. The UK must stand on the side of international law and justice, and act now to help prevent further atrocity.”
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A view of gigantic poster as daily life continues despite the ongoing conflict in Tehran, Iran on April 1, 2026. [Fatemeh Bahrami – Anadolu Agency]
The US has intensified diplomatic pressure on Oman, demanding the Gulf state abandon its historic neutrality and sever diplomatic relations with Iran, according to a Wall Street Journal story on Monday, Anadolu Agency reports.
American and Arab officials indicated that Washington now views Oman’s policy on Iran as being actively hostile to US interests.
The Trump administration has reportedly threatened to impose sanctions or even launch military strikes against Oman following intelligence assessments suggesting the country might join Iran in taxing commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz. Both countries have coasts on the strategic waterway.
The Omani leadership has denied these allegations, maintaining that its neutral stance is essential for regional mediation. However, US officials remain skeptical, citing Oman’s refusal to explicitly denounce Iranian military actions.
Friction between the two capitals reportedly began just before the current conflict when Washington felt the Omani foreign minister provided inaccurate assessments on a potential nuclear deal.
US President Donald Trump last week fueled these tensions by warning that Oman must cooperate or face military consequences. “Oman will behave just like everybody else, or we’ll have to blow ‘em up,” said Trump.
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Members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) participate in a military exercise aimed at “increasing combat capabilities” in Tehran province, Iran, on May 12, 2026. [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps – Anadolu Agency]
A spokesman for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said Tuesday that the readiness of the country’s armed forces today “is more than in the past,” claiming Tehran will use “different” types of weapons in case of a renewed war with the US and Israel.
“The best reason for this issue is that despite the use of its vast capacity on land, sea and air, America could not remove the Strait of Hormuz from Iran’s control even for a few minutes,”
Sardar Mohebbi said in a statement carried by the semi-official news agency Tasnim.
Mohebbi said Tehran is ready for “all possible scenarios,” adding that Washington “failed to achieve its goals” in the Strait of Hormuz during the latest round of the conflict.
Tensions in the Middle East have escalated since the US and Israel launched strikes on Iran in February. Tehran retaliated with attacks targeting Israel and US allies in the Gulf, alongside the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
A ceasefire took effect on April 8 through Pakistani mediation, but subsequent talks in Islamabad failed to produce a lasting agreement. Efforts for a solution, however, have continued since.
An aerial view of buildings and a parking area opposite the Jabal Amel Hospital, the largest hospital in the city of Tyre, Lebanon, on June 2, 2026, shows damage from an Israeli strike. (Photo by Houssam Shbaro/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“The more Netanyahu prevents the war with Iran from ending, the more obvious it becomes that he convinced Trump to start it.”
The death toll from Israel’s assault on Lebanon continued to rise on Tuesday despite President Donald Trump’s claims of de-escalation following Monday phone calls with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and an intermediary for Hezbollah.
The Lebanese Ministry of Public Healthsaid Tuesday that “the cumulative toll of the aggression from March 2 to June 2 has reached 3,468 dead and 10,577 injured,” even amid a ceasefire agreed to in April. The deal stemmed from Trump and Netanyahu’s illegal war on Iran, and Israel initially claimed it did not include Lebanon.
After Iran on Monday reportedly halted talks with the US over Israel’s attacks on Lebanon, Trump said on his Truth Social platform that due to his phone calls, Israeli troops “have already been turned back” from Beirut, and Hezbollah “agreed that all shooting will stop—That Israel will not attack them, and they will not attack Israel.”
However, Netanyahu said later Monday that “I spoke this evening with President Trump and told him that if Hezbollah does not stop attacking our cities and civilians, Israel will strike terrorist targets in Beirut. This position remains unchanged.”
According to Axios reporting contested by a senior Israeli official, one US source summarized Trump’s remarks to Netanyahu as follows: “You’re fucking crazy. You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me. I’m saving your ass. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this.”
Another source said that Trump was “pissed” and at one point yelled at the prime minister, “What the fuck are you doing?”
While “the story has understandably been met with considerable skepticism,” wrote Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, there are “a few important counterexamples—particularly from Trump’s second term—that suggest the Axios story is not entirely implausible.”
“What is also plausible, however, is that Trump will once again fail to sustain the pressure and, by that, allow for Netanyahu’s potential retreat to prove temporary,” Parsi predicted.
Netanyahu’s stenographer says the @axios report that Trump scolded/swore at Netanyahu is bullshit. No idea which is accurate, but both Biden and now Trump often claim to be hard on Netanyahu in private while in practice giving him everything he wants and more. https://t.co/E904beSVhz
Republican Congressman Thomas Massie (Ky.), a libertarian who recently lost his reelection primary to a Trump-backed challenger, responded to the reporting on social media: “It’s all talk. Just withhold foreign aid to Israel for a month, and they’ll stop bombing their neighbors—instant peace, the Strait of Hormuz can be opened, and gas drops $2 a gallon. Israel has been, and continues to be, the biggest welfare recipient from American taxpayers.”
Massie also said that “the more Netanyahu prevents the war with Iran from ending, the more obvious it becomes that he convinced Trump to start it.”
Progressive Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (Minn.) similarly said late Monday: “The lesson Israel has learned, time and again, is that it can commit genocide and other atrocities with near-total impunity. Now it’s exporting the Gaza playbook to Lebanon. Israel’s war in Lebanon is killing thousands and displacing over a million. NO MORE US AID TO ISRAEL.”
Citing Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) on Tuesday, Al Jazeera cataloged Israel’s killings since Trump’s de-escalation claims:
Two Syrians were killed in an Israeli attack on a plant nursery where they were working in the town of Jebchit in the Nabatieh governorate, NNA said on Tuesday.
Israeli drone strikes hit a motorcycle on Martyr Sabra Street in Toul and a car in the Dhi’at al-Arab neighborhood of Ansar, killing two people, NNA said.
The third strike hit a car near the village of Harouf, killing one person.
Separately, an Israeli drone strike hit a car on the road linking the southern town of Marjayoun with the city of Nabatieh, killing James Karam, a dentist from the nearby Christian municipality of Qlayaa, along with his daughter and son, NNA reported.
Those deaths followed Israel’s Monday airstrike in the southern village of Marwaniyeh, which killed six members of the Hassan Abdullah family, according to the Lebanese Civil Defense. Palestine Chronicle reported that “rescue teams worked throughout the night and into Tuesday morning to recover victims trapped beneath the rubble of the destroyed building. Three additional people were pulled from the debris during the operation.”
After Trump announced a fresh ceasefire in Lebanon, Israel carried out a massacre last night against the Hassan Abdullah family from the town of Marwaniyeh by targeting their home, killing the entire family.
Also on Monday, Israel attacked the Jabal Amel Hospital in Tyre, killing at least four people and injuring dozens more.
Dr. Abdinasir Abubakar, the World Health Organization (WHO) representative in Lebanon, said Tuesday that the hospital is one of the few operating in the country’s south, and the attack “caused significant damage… to the emergency department and intensive care unit.”
“Six hospitals have not yet resumed maternity delivery services and are currently providing only emergency room care,” he noted. “For pregnant women and newborns, delays in care can mean the difference between life and death.”
WHO has verified nearly 200 attacks on healthcare facilities and workers in Lebanon over the past three months. Calling for such attacks “to stop” and “active protection for healthcare,” Abubakar stressed that “these attacks kill and maim, they also deprive people of the health services they need.”
Israeli airstrikes hit near Jabel Amel hospital in Tyre, southern Lebanon causing extensive damage to the hospital, which was still crowded with people, including women and children.
The strikes are part of Israel’s escalating military offensive in Lebanon, which has also… pic.twitter.com/pUBtWoUPVv
Israel hit Jabal Amel Hospital after a strike near Hiram Hospital the previous day, according to Doctors Without Borders, which supports both facilities. Omar Ebeid, the organization’s project coordinator in southern Lebanon, said Tuesday that “these repeated attacks reflect a grave failure to protect the medical mission and underscore the urgent need to safeguard civilians, medical staff, health facilities, and continuous access to lifesaving care.”
Faced with a rising death toll and Israeli forces’ destruction of civilian infrastructure, The Associated Press reported, “another round of talks between Israel and Lebanon began Tuesday in Washington, where Lebanese negotiators are set to seek a full ceasefire that will prevent future attacks.”
Donald Trump calls for help from NATO allies in securing the Strait of Hormuz despite saying on 7 March 2026 that they don’t need people to join wars after they’ve already won. He’s challenged with the claim that he lies as much as the IDF.Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/
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Speaker of the Iranian Parliament Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf in Tehran, Iran on April 16, 2026. [Iranian Parliament Speaker Office – Anadolu Agency]
Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf told his Lebanese counterpart Nabih Berri during a phone call that Tehran is determined to secure a ceasefire across all of Lebanon, including the south.
During the call, Ghalibaf said: “If the crimes continue, we will stop the negotiations.”
He added: “The bond between Iran and Lebanon is inseparable, and our lives and your lives are one.”
Ghalibaf said that if an agreement is reached to end the war between Iran and the United States, it would include a halt to attacks on all fronts, particularly Lebanon.
He stressed that “if the crimes continue, we will not only stop the negotiations, but we will also stand against the Zionist entity.”
For his part, Berri said: “Lebanon will never forget Iran’s positive positions during this critical period.”
Earlier, Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency reported that the Iranian negotiating team had suspended the exchange of messages with the United States through mediators following Israeli attacks on Lebanon.
Citing sources, the agency said: “Given the continued crimes of the Zionist entity in Lebanon, and because Lebanon was one of the preconditions for a ceasefire, and since that ceasefire has now been violated on all fronts, including Lebanon, the Iranian negotiating team is suspending dialogues and the exchange of messages through mediators.”
The developments come amid rising tensions between Iran, the United States and Israel, as Tehran seeks to ensure that any ceasefire covers all regional fronts, including Lebanon, while clashes between Israel and Hezbollah continue to escalate.
