Latest Israeli air raid on Rafah has led to severe criticism among the international community

An Israeli air strike on a displaced persons camp in Rafah, Gaza killed 45 civilians, drawing widespread condemnation despite Netanyahu's vowing to continue the military offensive.

An attack on a camp for Palestinian refugees in Rafah, Gaza on Sunday by the Israeli air force has attracted condemnation across the global diplomatic order after it claimed the lives of over 40 refugees, among them women and children.  

The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said a raid killed 45 people and left hundreds of others injured with burns, fractures, and shrapnel wounds. It also emerged that graphic videos that circulated on social media depicted the fire raging at the scene and emergency services evacuating wounded individuals, some of them being children.  

The medical aid group Doctors Without Borders (MSF) stated that ‘The strike targeted one of its clinics where the group received 28 dead bodies,’ and it described the incident as an ‘attack on a populated camp in a so-called safe zone’.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu admitted that the incident occurred in a deadly strike was a “tragic mistake” but assured that Israel would continue its operations against Hamas to achieve all the set objectives. He said that the Israeli forces were being very cautious not to harm civilians in any way possible.

However, the deadly incident ignored a ruling last week by the United Nations International Court of Justice in which it directed Israel to stop its attack on Rafah to avoid further deaths of Palestinian noncombatants. UN Secretary-General António Guterres stated that “there is no safe place in Gaza” and called for putting an end to the suffering by saying, “This horror must stop. ”

The European Union and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights also deplored the air strike and remarked if Israel had switched its warfare tactics after it killed numerous Gazan civilians in the past.  

While the US described the images as ‘heartbreaking’, it justified that Israel has a right to defend itself against Hams's rocket attacks. But it also said that Israel ‘‘has to make every effort to avoid the civilian death. ’’

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While Israeli authorities search for answers for how the ‘surgical strike’ devolved into a catastrophe, the public demands Netanyahu to account for the fatalities, and the possible withdrawal of the plan to carry on with the attacks around Rafah, as the world condemns the act.