Canada 'horrified' by Israeli airstrike on tent camp in Rafah

HAMILTON, Canada

Canada on Monday denounced Israel's recent airstrike on tents housing displaced people in the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.

"We are horrified by strikes that killed Palestinian civilians in Rafah," Foreign Minister Melanie Joly wrote on X.

Stressing that "Canada does not support an Israeli military operation in Rafah," Joly demanded such human suffering to come to an end.

"We demand an immediate cease-fire," she reiterated.

At least 45 people were killed, most of them women and children, and nearly 250 others injured in an Israeli strike on a camp for displaced people in Rafah on Sunday.

The attack came despite a ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that ordered Israel to halt its offensive in Rafah, where over a million Palestinians had sought refuge from the Israel-Hamas war before the city was invaded on May 6.

Israel has killed more than 36,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip since a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7 last year, which killed around 1,200 people.

The military campaign has turned much of the enclave of 2.3 million people into ruins, leaving most civilians homeless and at risk of famine.