Thank you for following our coverage of the ongoing reaction to the Israeli air strike which killed seven international aid workers in Gaza on Monday.

For a recap on what happened, see BBC Verify's analysis of what we know about the strike.

Is this a watershed moment in the Israel Gaza war? Read the BBC's international editor Jeremy Bowen's analysis on the way this week may have changed the war.

And you can read more about the lives and legacies of the aid workers who were killed here.

This page was edited by Emily McGarvey, Aoife Walsh and Johanna Chisholm. The writers were Gabriela Pomeroy, Ali Abbas Ahmadi, Ruth Comerford, Nadia Ragozhina, Alex Smith, Christy Cooney and Joe McFadden.

We're going to be pausing our live coverage soon but before we do, here are the latest updates on the Israeli air strike which killed seven aid workers on Monday, including three Britons.

• International outcry continues with leaders of the UK, US, Canada and Australia among those condemning the strike on the food aid convoy
• The bodies of the aid workers are in the process of being repatriated to their home countries via Egypt
• World Central Kitchen founder José Andrés accused Israeli forces in Gaza of targeting the aid workers "systematically, car by car"
• Israel insists the strike on aid workers was unintentional, with economy minister Nir Barkat telling the BBC it is "nonsense" to suggest Israel would deliberately target aid workers
• Some charities have paused their operations since the strike, increasing fears of starvation
• The UN is suspending its overnight operations in Gaza for at least 48 hours "to evaluate security", a spokesperson says

• We've learned more about what the three killed British men were doing in Gaza. The head of the security company which employed them told the BBC they worked as security advisers, ensuring the convoy followed safety procedures and remained on the correct route
• Rishi Sunak is facing growing pressure over UK arms sales to Israel after the incident

Image source, PA Media

Israel's Economy Minister Nir Barkat tells the BBC it is "nonsense" to suggest that Israel deliberately targeted aid workers in the air strike that killed seven on Monday night.

The founder of World Central Kitchen José Andrés says he believes the attack was no mistake.

Responding to this allegation, Barkat tells the BBC's Caitriona Perry: "With all due respect, there's no way in the world that Israel would target people that come to give people aid.

"That's nonsense. I'm sorry, give us a bit of a respect that we care about those people."

He says the Israeli military would "never target people like this", adding that he is sure that this was a mistake.

"The Israeli army will interrogate this and give the families of the people who were killed all the details. We want to make sure it doesn't happen again," he says, adding that the strike was not intentional.

"I'll tell you what is intentional. On 7 October, they [Hamas and other groups] entered the villages in Israel, they raped women and killed them while they're raping them."

"Hamas want to wipe Israel off the map. They are hiding behind the civilians," he adds.

Israeli cabinet minister Benny Gantz has called for early elections to be held in September, as Israeli PM Netanyahu faces pressure and huge demonstrations demanding his resignation.

Millions of Israelis who believe they are fighting a just war against Hamas have no confidence in Netanyahu, the BBC's Jeremy Bowen explains.

Many are angry at him for prolonging the war to put off the moment when he is held accountable for his mistakes, failing to bring Israel's hostages home safely, and alienating vital allies starting with President Biden.

Reacting to Gantz, Netanyahu's Likud party said elections during war "will bring about paralysis, division, harm to the fighting in Rafah and a fatal blow to the chances of a hostage deal".

Image source, Reuters

A US official has confirmed President Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu will speak to each other tomorrow, according to reports by Reuters news agency.

It will be the first time the leaders have spoken since the Israeli air strike which killed seven World Central Kitchen aid workers in Gaza on Monday.

Biden has said he was "outraged and heartbroken" over the killings and accused Israel of not doing enough to protect aid workers.

Earlier, US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said the US wants a "full, transparent and swift investigation" into the incident.

Image source, Getty Images

We've reported that World Central Kitchen (WCK) founder José Andrés says he thinks Israel deliberately targeted his aid workers.

Now, a spokesperson for Cogat - the Israeli defence ministry body in charge of co-ordinating aid deliveries to Gaza and liaising between the aid agencies and the Israeli military - insists there wasn’t a problem with the information they passed on to the IDF about the convoy’s movements.

Speaking to BBC's Newshour programme, Cogat spokesman Shimon Freedman says the strike on the aid workers was a "grave mistake" and an “absolute tragedy”.

“It was a mistake that followed a misidentification but we’ve set up an independent professional body to look into the incident and investigate."

He adds that he does not think there was a systemic problem because the IDF co-ordinates with aid agencies on the ground every day as a matter of course.

"There are dozens of co-ordinations a day and hundreds of thousands of co-ordinations that have happened since the beginning of the war."

The cousins of James Kirby, one of the three British aid workers who died in an Israeli airstrike on Gaza, have been telling us more about what the 47-year-old from Bristol was like.

"He was completely selfless," his cousin Adam McGuire tells the BBC. "He knew the dangers, he was no fool... but he just wanted to help people."

Watch the full clip below by pressing the play button.

Image source, Reuters

More comments now from World Central Kitchen (WCK) founder José Andrés, who earlier accused Israel of deliberately targeting the seven aid workers in Gaza, in an interview with Reuters.

He's now spoken to Israeli broadcaster Channel 12 news, saying: “The airstrikes on our convoy, I don’t think were an unfortunate mistake. It was really a direct attack on clearly marked vehicles whose movements were known by everybody at the IDF."

He stresses that the WCK convoy was in a deconflicted zone controlled by the Israeli forces when it was attacked.

Andrés says no one is questioning Israel's right to defend itself, but "defending your people is not killing everybody else around".

Israel said the strike was "unintended" and that WCK workers were not deliberately targeted.

Monday’s strike on an aid convoy in Gaza “proves yet again that there is no safe place” in the territory, a spokeswoman for charity Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) said.

“Whether you are Palestinian, British, or any other nationality, Gaza is the most dangerous place in the world now to be an aid worker,” Aseel Baidoun told the BBC.

In January, a compound housing staff from MAP and other aid groups was hit by an Israeli strike, injuring a number of people and forcing the organisation to relocate to another site in Gaza.

Asked whether she believed Israel was deliberately targeting aid convoys, Baidoun said she remained “uncertain” but called on the Israeli government to provide “transparency”.

“We just need a clear explanation. We just need a clear assurance that this will not happen again."

Image source, EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez says explanations provided by Israel about the killing of seven people working for the aid charity World Central Kitchen in a Gaza airstrike were "insufficient" and "unacceptable".Earlier this week, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had called the incident "a tragic event in which our forces unintentionally harmed non-combatants", adding that "this happens in war".

Sanchez, however, is demanding further details.

He says he is "awaiting a much stronger and more detailed clarification, after which we'll see what action to take".

World Central Kitchen was founded by Spanish American chef José Andrés.

Image source, US State Department

US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller has just held a media briefing where he addressed Israel's killing of the seven World Central Kitchen personnel in Gaza. Here are some of the key points he made:

• Miller begins by saying the US wants to see a "full, transparent and swift investigation" into the killing of the WCK aid workers
• Their killings raise "real concerns" about the safety of aid workers in Gaza
• Israel "need[s] to put in place better deconfliction and better coordination measures" to protect humanitarian workers and to protect all civilians on the ground, he says
• A proposal to set up a situation room to better co-ordinate humanitarian efforts "is overdue"
• Ultimately, he says the US will judge the measures that Israel puts into place "by the results, not the intent"
• Miller closes by saying this will not affect US efforts to create a floating pier off Gaza to bring more aid into the enclave through the sea

Image source, Getty Images

As we reported earlier, multiple aid organisations, including the UN in recent hours, have said that they will be pausing operations in Gaza after an attack on a charity convoy killed seven aid workers.

This includes the World Central Kitchen, which had 68 kitchens across the enclave, along with the American Near East Refugee Aid (ANERA) and Project Hope, which provides healthcare aid.

These announcements have sparked increasing concern about the disruption of aid in Gaza, which is on the brink of a famine.

Half the population - about 1.1m people - are starving, according to the IPC classification. Before April, the UN's worst-case scenario estimated that the entire population will be in famine by July 2024.

Gaza has the "highest share of people facing high levels of acute food insecurity that the IPC initiative has ever classified for any given area or country," the UN has said.

Its most senior human rights official, Volker Türk, told the BBC that Israel bore significant blame for the crisis in Gaza, and there was a "plausible" case that it was using starvation as a weapon of war.

Israel has vehemently denied this.

• Read our full article about when a famine is declared here

Iqra Farooq
BBC World Service

Image source, Fikr Shalltoot

And now for the perspective of Fikr Shalltoot, the Gaza director for Medical Aid for Palestinians.

She also spoke with BBC World Service's OS programme earlier, saying it is imperative now that the international community step up and help deliver a ceasefire.

"Nobody imagined this would happen - especially for people who were driving in a marked vehicle," she says.

“People should be angry for the killing of the aid workers but also for the killing for every civilian inside Gaza. Most of the children being killed are children and women. We should be angry for those who have lost their lives - they have done nothing wrong."

Iqra Farooq
BBC World Service

We've been hearing from Palestinian aid workers and getting their reaction to the seven World Central Kitchen staff who were killed in Gaza.

Naser Qadous is Palestinian and works for humanitarian organisation Anera. He knew Damian Sobol and Zomi Frankcom, two of the aid workers who were killed.

Naser tells the BBC World Service’s OS programme that “Zomi Frankcom was energetic, always smiling and very friendly and helpful. She was so motivated to help people and had a special character".

Naser is currently working in Ramallah in the West Bank, where he says distributing aid is difficult because after 7 October, most of the roads are closed.

“Ramallah is not safe too. We’re 100 kilometres from projects in Jenin – it takes five hours now and used to take an hour and a half to get there,” he says.

Image source, Reuters

World Central Kitchen founder José Andrés has accused Israeli forces in Gaza of targeting the aid workers in a strike that killed seven members of his staff on Monday, "systematically, car by car".

Speaking to Reuters news agency, Andrés says that the killing of seven WCK personnel was not a mistake or a misfire, and asserts that the Israelis knew their movements at the time of the attack.

"Even if we were not in coordination with the (Israeli army), no democratic country and no military can be targeting civilians and humanitarians," he says.

Israel's military has expressed its "severe sorrow" over the incident, while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the strike was unintentional.

The leader of Hamas has said the group are "committed" to their demands for a ceasefire in Gaza - including asking for the withdrawal of the Israeli military from the territory.

"We are committed to our demands: the permanent ceasefire, comprehensive and complete withdrawal of the enemy out of the Gaza Strip, the return of all displaced people to their homes, allowing all aid needed for our people in Gaza, rebuilding the Strip, lifting the blockade and achieving an honourable prisoner exchange deal," Ismail Haniyeh said in a televised speech.

Earlier today, the prime minister of Qatar - a mediator in ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas - said the main point of dispute was over the return of displaced people to different parts of the Palestinian territory.

Image source, Reuters

A cargo ship carrying 240 tonnes of food meant for Gaza has returned to Cyprus, after Israeli air strikes killed seven World Central Kitchen aid workers.

The undelivered aid was part of a 340 tonne consignment sent from Cyprus on 30 March for the desperate Palestinians in Gaza, which the UN says is on the brink of famine.

The aid workers from WCK had just finished unloading 100 tonnes of aid from a barge - also sent from Cyprus - when they were killed on Monday night.

Their killing has prompted the WCK - which had been active in Gaza since October - and other aid groups to suspend their operations in the Palestinian enclave.

Return of displaced Gazans obstacle in truce talks - Qatar PMpublished at 18:14 British Summer Time 3 April

18:14 BST 3 April

Sebastian Usher
BBC Arab Affairs Editor

Hopes for a truce in Gaza have faded after a flurry of activity ahead of Ramadan - and the latest comments emerging over the status of negotiations suggest that little progress has been made.

The prime minister of Qatar, which has been playing a key role in mediation, says the obstacles are the same as back in February.

Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani did say that the Hamas demand for displaced Palestinians to be able to return to all parts of Gaza had become a major bone of contention.

The political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, has also reiterated that his movement is sticking to all its conditions for a truce; Hamas wants an end to the war, an influx of aid, the return of Gazans to their homes, a prisoner exchange with Israel and reconstruction.

It seems that for now, at least, the gap between the positions of Hamas and the Israeli government remains too wide to reach a deal.

We're now getting some images of the ambulance convoy carrying the bodies of some of the aid workers killed in Gaza on Monday, crossing the Rafah border into Egypt.

The vehicles arrived at the Gaza side of the border earlier to take the bodies out of the territory so that they can be repatriated to their home countries.

Image source, EPA

Image source, EPA

Image source, EPA

The UN is suspending its overnight operations in Gaza for at least 48 hours, "to evaluate security", spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric says.

He adds that he is aware the move will have a "real impact" on those dependent on aid.

"UNRWA is the backbone of our humanitarian organisation," he says.

Dujarric does not provide specifics about when the suspension will begin or what it will entail, but confirms that other agencies will continue to be working in the area at night.

UN teams, he adds, are still working to assist victims of the recent al-Shifa hospital raid.