UK foreign secretary condemns ‘Reckless’ Iran attack on Israel as UN chief says region on ‘brink

UK foreign secretary Cameron: 'reckless and dangerous' attack on Israel was a 'double defeat' for Iran

Describing it as “a reckless and dangerous thing for Iran to have done”, the UK’s foreign secretary David Cameron said that Tehran’s attack was a “double defeat”, as it had failed to inflict damage on Israel, and that “they’ve revealed to the world that they are the malign influence in the region.”

On Sky News in the UK he stressed how large the attack had been, specifying that it had featured “301 weapons – 110 ballistic missiles and 40 cruise missiles. This was very significant.”

He said “if you’re sitting in Israel this morning, you’re thinking quite rightly, we have every right to respond to this, and they do, but we are urging that they shouldn’t escalate.”

He continued “our hope is that there won’t be a retaliatory response, and instead, the world’s focus should shift to Hamas. They still hold those hostages. They’ve been offered a deal that prisoners can be released from Israeli jails in return for some of those hostages, and there’ll be a pause in the fighting. That’s what needs to happen next.

“I think the smart thing to do is actually to recognise that Iran’s attack was a failure. And we want to keep the focus on that, on Iran’s malign influence, and actually pivot to looking at what’s happening in Gaza, and getting those hostages released.”

German chancellor Olaf Scholz is in Shanghai, and Reuters reports that while there he has warned Iran not to launch another attack on Israel, but said the Israeli government must also contribute to cooling tensions.

Reuters has a quick flash that Benjamin Netanyahu will reconvene his war cabinet at 2pm local time (11am GMT).

Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that two Palestinian men have been injured after being shot with live ammunition during an Israeli military incursion into the Israeli-occupied West Bank city of Nablus.