Gaza aid ship with Greta Thunberg onboard diverted by Israeli forces – live updates

Image source, Getty Images

As we mentioned earlier, among the 12-strong crew on board the Madleen was Rima Hassan, a French member of the European Parliament.

France is one of the countries leading the call for recognition of a Palestinian state.

It will co-host a United Nations conference in New York later this month with Saudi Arabia aimed at taking steps to achieve a two-state solution, which proposes an independent Palestinian state to co-exist alongside Israel. This is something Israel rejects.

“We must urgently move from words to deeds. We must move from ending the war in Gaza to ending the conflict itself,” Anne-Claire Legendre, Middle East and North Africa advisor to French President Emmanuel Macron had said at a UN session earlier last month.

“Faced with the facts on the ground, the prospects of a Palestinian State must be maintained,” she added.

The Hamas run health ministry estimates around 54,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the start of the war.