More than 2,000 British artists have called for an immediate Gaza ceasefire, as Israeli air strikes have killed more than 2,800 Palestinians, a quarter of them children, and driven around half of the 2.3 million Gazans from their homes.

According to Mediaite, the artists include Tilda Swinton, Steve Coogan, and Miriam Margolyes.

On Tuesday, a group known as Artists For Palestine published a petition in which the group blamed the world governments for not just tolerating but “aiding and abetting” Israel’s “war crimes” in Gaza.

The signatories also include directors Mike Leigh and Asif Kapadia and authors Marina Warner and Gillian Slovo. They have expressed their concerns about Israel’s Minister of Defence Yoav Gallant’s portrayal of Palestinians as “human animals”. They condemn his decision to put 2.3 million residents of Gaza under siege.

“We are witnessing a crime and a catastrophe. Israel has reduced much of Gaza to rubble, and cut off the supply of water, power, food and medicine to 2.3 million Palestinians. In the words of the UN’s undersecretary for humanitarian affairs, ‘the spectre of death’ is hanging over the territory,” it read.

The letter, which was also reported by The Independent, recalled the forced evacuation of Palestinians in 1948.

“Gaza is already a society of refugees and the children of refugees. Now, in their hundreds of thousands, bombarded from air, sea and land, Palestinians whose grandparents were forced out of their homes at the barrel of a gun are again being told to flee – or face collective punishment on an unimaginable scale,” it said.

The group added that there would be a time when the governments supporting Israel were held to account for their complicity.

“Our obligation is to do all we can to bring an end to the unprecedented cruelty being inflicted on Gaza.”