Ever since 2014, the UK has been at the forefront of trying to push back Russia’s encroachment into Ukraine, including opposing the full-scale invasion of 2022. Britain worked hard to ensure that the US and Europe acted collectively to repel the Russian forces and sanction Moscow.

In just three weeks, US President Donald Trump has shaken up the global order, rewritten it even. He has certainly flooded the zone and the world is now watching to see who will sink and who will swim.

It is hard to think of any moment when a major international institution has taken a decision of genuine import to challenge Israeli impunity. The UN Security Council has done so on occasions, but typically a US veto, or even just the threat of one, prevents this.

When outgoing US President Joe Biden last week explained that the Israel-Hamas deal was broadly identical to the one he announced last May, he thought he was promoting his own role. In fact, it was a savage indictment of his own failure — a confession, even.

Northern Gaza is no more, at least not as a livable, populated area. This was not an asteroid strike or a tsunami. But such a fate might have been kinder to the nearly 3 million people who have been compelled to undergo deprivations most of us can barely understand.