A member of the Labour Party sits outside a polling station near Russell Square, central London London, during the local elections, on May 2, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Britain’s governing Conservative Party is suffering heavy losses as local election results pour in Friday, piling pressure on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak ahead of a U.K. general election in which the main opposition Labour Party appears increasingly likely to return to power after 14 years.

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Labour won control of councils in England it hasn’t held for decades and was successful in a special by-election for Parliament. Its only negative has been in some areas with large Muslim populations, such as Oldham in northwest England, where the party’s candidates appear to have suffered as a result of leader Keir Starmer ‘s strongly pro-Israel stance in the conflict in Gaza.

Perhaps of most importance in the context of the looming general election, Labour won Blackpool South, a long-time Labour seat in the northwest of England that went Conservative in the last general election in 2019, when then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson won a big victory. In the contest, triggered by the resignation of a Conservative lawmaker following a lobbying scandal, Labour’s Chris Webb secured 10,825 votes, 7,607 more than his second-placed Conservative opponent.

“This seismic win in Blackpool South is the most important result today,” Starmer said. “This is the one contest where voters had the chance to send a message to Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives directly, and that message is an overwhelming vote for change.”

Thursday’s elections were important in themselves, with voters deciding who will run many aspects of their daily lives, such as garbage collection, road maintenance and local crime prevention, in the coming years. But with a general election looming, they will be viewed through a national prism.

Starmer next Labour PM?

The results so far provide more evidence that Labour is likely to form the next government — and by quite a margin — and that Mr. Starmer will become Prime Minister.

As of early Friday, with barely a quarter of the 2,661 seats up for grabs counted, the Conservatives were down 115 while Labour was up 60. Labour has won in areas, which voted heavily for Britain’s departure from the European Union and where it was crushed by Johnson, such as Hartlepool in the northeast of England, and Thurrock in southeast England. It also seized control of Rushmoor, a leafy and military-heavy council in the south of England where it has never been in power.

John Curtice, professor of politics at the University of Strathclyde, said the results so far indicate that the Conservatives are losing around half of the seats they are trying to defend.

“We are probably looking at certainly one of the worst, if not the worst, Conservative performances in local government elections for the last 40 years,” he told BBC radio.

The results will roll in through Saturday. Mr. Sunak hopes he can point to successes, notably in several key mayoral races, to douse talk that the Conservative Party will change its leader again before the United Kingdom’s main election, which could take place as soon as next month.

Key to his survival could be the results of mayoral elections in Tees Valley in the northeast of England and in the West Midlands. The former is due Friday midday and the latter on Saturday. Should Conservative mayors Andy Street and Ben Houchen hold on, he may win some respite from restive lawmakers in his party. Should both lose, he may face trouble. Labour’s Sadiq Khan is expected to remain mayor of London when results are announced on Saturday..

Mr. Sunak could preempt any challenge by threatening to call a general election that has to take place before January 2025. He has the power to decide on the date and has indicated that it will be in the second half of 2024.

Mr. Sunak became Prime Minister in October 2022 after the short-lived tenure of his predecessor, Liz Truss, who left office after 49 days following a budget of unfunded tax cuts that roiled financial markets and sent borrowing costs for homeowners surging.

Her chaotic — and traumatic — leadership compounded the Conservatives’ difficulties following the circus surrounding her predecessor Johnson, who was forced to quit after being adjudged to have lied to Parliament over lockdown breaches at his offices in Downing Street.

Nothing Mr. Sunak has tried to do appears to have shifted the political dial, with Labour consistently 20 percentage points ahead in opinion polls, which would lead, if translated into a general election, to a landslide victory on a par with that achieved by Tony Blair in 1997.

The U.N. food agency says “famine is imminent” in northern Gaza, where an estimated 70% of the population faces catastrophic hunger.

The World Food Programme on March 18 released the latest findings of its Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, or IPC, an international process for estimating the scale of hunger crises. It said virtually everyone in Gaza is struggling to get enough food, and around 2,10,000 people in northern Gaza are in Phase 5, the highest, which refers to catastrophic hunger.

It warned that if Israel broadens its offensive to the packed southern city of Rafah, the fighting could drive around half of Gaza’s total population of 2.3 million into catastrophic hunger. In December, the IPC estimated that a quarter of Gaza’s overall population was starving.

Aid groups say they face a burdensome Israeli process to import humanitarian aid, and that distribution in much of Gaza, especially the north, is virtually impossible because of Israeli restrictions, ongoing hostilities and the breakdown of law and order.

Israel says it places no limits on the import of humanitarian aid and blames bottlenecks on the U.N. agencies distributing it.

The U.S. and other countries have carried out airdrops in recent days and a sea corridor has just opened up. But aid groups say those efforts are costly and inefficient, and are no substitute for Israel opening up more land routes.

Starvation is used as a weapon of war, says top EU diplomat

In a separate development, the European Union’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, accused Israel of continuing to hinder efforts to deliver aid to Gaza, saying the territory faces an “entirely man-made” famine as “starvation is used as a weapon of war.”

“We are in a state of famine, affecting thousands of people,” EU foreign policy chief Borrell said at an international aid conference in Brussels. “Starvation is used as a weapon of war.”

He went on to call for greater efficiency at the two functioning border crossings and for Israel to open additional ones.

“Israel has to do it. It is not a question of logistics. It is not because the United Nations has not provided enough support,” he said. “The support is there, waiting. Trucks are stopped. People are dying, while the land crossings are artificially closed.”

Israeli authorities say they place no limits on the entry of aid and accuse U.N. bodies of failing to distribute it in a timely manner, saying aid piles up on the Gaza side of the crossings. Aid groups say distribution is impossible in much of Gaza because of ongoing hostilities, the difficulty of coordinating with the military and the breakdown of law and order.

The international aid group Oxfam said Sunday that a “dysfunctional and undersized inspection system” snarls the entry of aid, with trucks stranded in long lines for 20 days on average The group says it has an entire warehouse filled with goods that were rejected, including oxygen, incubators and water and sanitation gear.

“Israeli authorities are not only failing to facilitate the international aid effort but are actively hindering it,” said Oxfam Mideast director Sally Abi Khalil.

Al Shifa hospital targeted

Meanwhile, Israeli forces launched another raid on the Gaza Strip’s largest hospital on March 18, saying Hamas militants had regrouped there and had fired on them from inside the compound, where Palestinian officials say tens of thousands of people have been sheltering.

The army last raided Al Shifa hospital in November after claiming that Hamas maintained an elaborate command centre within and beneath the facility. The military revealed a tunnel leading to some underground rooms, as well as weapons it said were found inside the hospital. But the evidence fell short of the earlier claims, and critics accused the army of recklessly endangering the lives of civilians.

People sheltering in the hospital said Israeli forces backed by tanks and artillery had surrounded the medical complex and that snipers were shooting at people inside. They said the army raided a number of buildings and detained dozens of people.

“We’re trapped inside,” said Abdel-Hady Sayed, who has been sheltering in the medical facility for over three months. “They fire at anything moving. … Doctors and ambulances can’t move.”

Gaza’s Health Ministry said the Israeli army was directing gun and missile fire at a building used for specialized surgeries. It said a fire broke out at the hospital’s gate. The ministry said around 30,000 people are sheltering at the hospital, including patients, medical staff and people who have fled their homes seeking safety.

Airdrops by the U.S. and other nations continue, while deliveries on a new sea route have begun, but aid groups say it’s essential that Israel open up more ground routes and ease restrictions to meet the mounting humanitarian needs.

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Magdy reported from Cairo and Goldenberg from Tel Aviv, Israel. Associated Press writer Lorne Cook in Brussels contributed.

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Find more of AP’s coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war