“Neither dead nor alive, they are walking corpses.” That is how the head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees this week described people in Gaza who, after almost two years of war, are now confronted with starvation.

For a brief moment it had looked like a ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel might give respite to those in need, but talks fell apart, again, with the U.S. and Israel withdrawing their delegations.

“The failure to reach a truce means there is no end in sight to the Israeli siege of Gaza which has devastated the territory for more than 21 months,” writes Ali Mamouri in a piece looking at the fallout of the collapsed talks.

But the catastrophe unfolding in Gaza is not just the failure of negotiating teams in Qatar, it is a failure of the world, another article published this week argues. As Palestinian families struggle to feed themselves and suffer the horrors of an ongoing siege, “the world’s leaders look on,” writes Simon Mabon: “Most are apparently content to condemn – but little action has been taken.”

The article was published before France announced that it will formally recognize a Palestinian state, and Mabon notes that other Western governments are under pressure to do the same. But he also outlines other actions Israel’s traditional allies in the West can take to pressure the country into alleviating the plight of Gazans. These include a full arms embargo, a commitment to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should he enter their countries – as they are obliged to do following the International Criminal Court arrest warrant – and measures akin to the campaign to turn Apartheid-era South Africa into a pariah state.

These measures would, of course, risk damaging relations with Washington, which has been quick to sanction voices critical of Israel. But Mabon argues that “the failure by Israel’s allies to take meaningful steps to pressure Israel to prevent the wanton killing and displacement is a stain on humanity.”

Elsewhere this week, we have been keeping an eye on protests in Ukraine and explaining the escalating conflict on the Thai-Cambodian border.