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UK beauty brand Lush Cosmetics has shut down all its stores and factories in the UK, as well as its website for the country for one day today (September 3), in solidarity with the people of Gaza. In a press release available on the company’s UK retail site, the brand said it was struggling to find other ways to help, “whilst the Israeli government is preventing urgent humanitarian assistance from entering Gaza”.

The brand’s retail site for the UK is redirecting visitors to a black screen with the words, “STOP STARVING GAZA — WE ARE CLOSED IN SOLIDARITY”. A link given on the site leads to a statement saying the only help the brand can send at this time is its love and a strong message, which it is hoping to do by closing down its business for a day.

The statement apologised to anyone who had been inconvenienced by the closure, but hoped people would understand, citing the popularity of their previous fundraising effort for Gaza. The brand said their fundraising soap, Watermelon Slice, had been the single most successful single-issue product in the brand’s history and they planned to reintroduce it to help support medical services and the provision of prosthetics to people in Gaza.

Lush said it would lose a day’s earnings, but hoped the loss of the day’s tax contributions would send a strong enough message to the UK government to work towards an end to the death and destruction in Gaza and halt arms sales to Israel.

This moves comes just two days ahead of the 700th day of Israel’s war on Gaza, which has so far claimed over 63,000 Palestinian lives. Since the war started in October 2023, Israel has committed grave abuses of international law, including attacks on hospitals, the indiscriminate killing of civilians and creating a famine in Gaza.

Cover photo: The Scotsman