Palestinians warn UK troops deployed in Gaza would be 'legitimate targets'

Palestinians have warned Britain and other US-led Western countries against deploying forces on the ground in the besieged Gaza Strip under the guise of supporting aid deliveries.

In a statement released on Sunday, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) said that British troops would be "treated as occupation forces and will be legitimate targets for the resistance." 

The Palestinian group added that the justification of troop deployment to assist aid deliveries via the new sea corridor was "a lie that does not deceive anyone." 

The report, published by the British state media broadcaster BBC on Saturday, said British forces – known as “wet boots”-- would drive trucks along a temporary causeway and deliver aid to a secure distribution area on land once a new sea route opens next month.

"Whoever wants to provide relief to the Palestinian people must press to stop the aggression, break the siege, and bring in relief aid through the official crossings in the Gaza Strip and under Palestinian management and supervision," the Palestinian group stated.

This comes even though the occupying regime continues to obstruct the delivery of aid into Gaza amid its genocidal war on the blockaded territory which started in early October last year. 

‘Direct involvement in genocide’: Resistance groups slam UK aerial spying of Gaza

Hamas and Islamic Jihad decried Britain’s decision to conduct Gaza surveillance flights as ‘direct involvement’ in Israel’s ‘genocidal war’ on the Strip.

Elsewhere in the statement, the PFLP also denounced the 1917 Balfour Declaration, which led to the creation of Israel.

"Our people will not forget the major crime committed by Britain against the Palestinian people, with its major contribution to the establishment of the Zionist entity, after issuing the ill-fated Balfour Declaration, and its continuation to this day in supporting the occupation and its crimes."

The declaration is widely seen as the precursor to the 1948 Palestinian Nakba, when Zionist armed paramilitary groups, who were trained and created to fight side by side with the British in World War II, forcibly expelled more than 750,000 Palestinians from their homeland.

"[It] is a justification for the permanent presence of military forces on the ground for malicious colonial goals and to protect the security of the Zionist entity," the PFLP said.

US sending more bombs, fighter jets to Israel for war in Gaza

The United States has in recent days quietly authorized the transfer of billions of dollars in bombs and fighter jets to Israel.

In the past 24 hours, Israeli Occupation Forces conducted seven massacres which took the lives of at least 66 Palestinians and injured nearly 140 others.

Since last October, with the start of the regime’s onslaught in the besieged territory, over 34,400 Palestinians have lost their lives and over 77,000 others have been injured. Many of them are women and children.

Thousands of victims also remain trapped under the rubble as Israeli forces prevent ambulance and civil defense crews from reaching them.

Israel has also imposed a “complete siege” on Gaza, cutting off fuel, electricity, food, and water to the more than two million Palestinians living there.

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