A top UN official says Israel’s attacks on ships carrying humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip is an "opportunity" to push Israel into lifting the blockade on the coastal sliver.

Nine people died last week when Israeli commandoes attacked a flotilla of ships carrying aid to the Gaza Strip. Forty others were injured in the attack on the peace activists.

"We very much want to see what’s happened, or use what’s happened, tragic as it is, as an opportunity to try to… persuade Israel to change policy," John Holmes, the UN’s Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs said.

"That’s the consequence we would like to see from all this," AFP quoted Holmes as saying.

The blockade was "unacceptable, counterproductive, (and) very damaging for the people of Gaza," he added.

"And I think there is a large amount of consensus about that now outside of Israel, that this is not an appropriate policy," the UN official stated.

(Press TV)