More than 800 serving officials in the US and Europe have signed a statement warning that their own governments’ policies on the Israel-Gaza war could amount to “grave violations of international law”.

BBC News says the “transatlantic statement” states that their administrations risk being complicit in “one of the worst human catastrophes of this century” but that their expert advice has been sidelined.

It is the latest sign of significant levels of dissent within the governments of some of Israel’s key Western allies.

BBC quoted one signatory, a US government official with more than 25 years’ national security experience, as saying “The voices of those who understand the region and the dynamics were not listened to. What’s really different here is we’re not failing to prevent something, we’re actively complicit. That is fundamentally different from any other situation I can recall.”

The statement is signed by civil servants from the US, the EU, and 11 European countries including the UK, France and Germany.