Doctors Without Borders calls for an immediate ceasefire following the deadly airstrike on Rafah (2024)

Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières)strongly denounced Sunday'sdeadly Israeli airstrike on a Rafah camp housing displaced people and called for an "immediate and sustained ceasefire" in Gaza.

The airstrike came "just a few days after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordered Israel to halt all military operations in Rafah," MSF noted in a statement Monday.

MSF said the airstrike on the camp "shows the complete disregard for the lives of civilians in Gaza."

"We are shocked by the continuous attacks on civilians, and we have no word to describe the horror of what we've seen here in Gaza," Gaia Giletta, MSF nurse activity manager, said in a voice note from Gaza.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the airstrike had gone tragically wrong.

"Despite our best effort not to harm those not involved, unfortunately a tragic mistake happened last night. We are investigating the case," Netanyahu said in a speech at the Israeli parliament Monday.

At least 45 people were killed and 200 wounded in the the Israeli strike, according to the government media office in Gaza.

Children and women living in makeshift tentswere among those killed in an Israeli airstrike on a camp for displaced people in Rafah on Sunday, according to a statement on social media from a top UN official.

The reporting is based on open-source photos and videos which were shared with UNRWA, including from social media, UNRWA spokesperson Juliette Touma told CNN.

The scenes from the city in southern Gaza are harrowing, Lazzarini said Monday, adding reports of more casualties continue to come.

The strike: At least 45 people were killed and 200 wounded after the Israeli strike hit a camp for displaced people, according to the government media office in Gaza.

Some UNWA staff in Rafah are unaccounted for and it has been challenging for the organization to establish contact with UNRWA teams in Rafah on Monday.

“The military operation in Rafah must immediately end,” Lazzarini said, adding he was dismayed by the “lack of implementation of the recent order of the International Court of Justice regarding Rafah.”

The ICJon Friday ordered Israel to “immediately halt” its military offensive in Rafah.

This post contains graphic descriptions of injuries.

An Israeli airstrike on a home in the Al-Zarqa neighborhood of northern Gaza on Monday killed at least five people, including a 4-year-old girl, according to the Palestinian Civil Defense in Gaza.

CNN video in the aftermath shows ambulances arriving at the scene, with paramedics, rescue workers, and local people clambering on top of the destroyed building.

The building was struck at 1:30 a.m., flattening the house, rescue workers said.Video shows, large pieces of metal and concrete that made up the structure crumpled in a heap of jagged debris.

Rescue workers are shown sifting through what remained of the building searching for survivors in near complete darkness, but they find no one alive.

They carefully and respectfully retrieve the dead from under the rubble, including the body of a girl, Qamar Al-Batran, who is 4 years old.

Carrying a flashlight and basic materials, a civil defense worker is seen trying to pull the young girl’s body from under the rubble but struggles with a cement ceiling pressing down on her lower body. He says he needs a large hammer to break it down.

The girl is seen being carried and taken on a stretcher to the front of the building where the ambulances are waiting. A couple of women rush to the ambulance, hug the girl’s body and scream out in horror at the sight.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Sunday's deadly Israeli airstrike on a Rafah camp had gone tragically wrong.

At least 45 people were killed and 200 wounded after the Israeli strike hit a camp for displaced people, according to the government media office in Gaza.

The Israeli military’s General Staff's Fact-Finding and Assessment Mechanism is investigating an airstrike carried out in Rafah on Sunday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in a statementonMonday.

This post has been updated after additional review of the translation from Hebrew to English, to clarify the wording used by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he referred to a deadly Israeli strike on Rafah, Gaza. The word 'error' was originally translated as 'mistake'.

The United Nation's High Commissioner for Human RightsVolker Türk has decried Israel's "horrific" strike on a camp housing displaced people in Rafah on Sunday.

"The images from the camp are horrific and point to no apparent change in the methods and means of warfare used by Israel that have already led to so many civilian deaths," Türk said in a statement Monday.

Türk echoed remarks given by his UN colleague, United Nations Relief and Works Agencyfor Palestine Refugees(UNRWA) spokesperson Juliette Touma to CNN earlier Monday, highlighting how the strike shows "there is literally no safe place in Gaza.”

Despite noting the Israeli military's plans to carry out a review into the strike, Türk called it "shockingly clear" that the decision to strike an area "densely packed with civilians" resulted in the "entirely predictable outcome" of at least 45 deaths.

The top UN official called on Israel to abide by the order from the International Court of Justice last week and halt its ground offensive in Rafah entirely.He also urged Palestinian armed groups to stop firing rockets indiscriminately into Israel "in clear violation of international humanitarian law" and release all of the hostages held in Gaza "at once."

European Council President Charles Michel on Monday also called the strikes “horrendous” and urged Israel to stop its offensive in Rafah.

“Horrendous to see innocent Palestinian civilians killed in the recent attack. There is no safe zone for the internally displaced in Rafah,” Michel said on X.

At a meeting of foreign ministers in Brussels, Turkey has argued that recognition of a Palestinian state should not be contingent on negotiations with Israel, according to a Turkish diplomatic source.

Delaying recognition “only buys more time for Israel,” the source told CNN.

Turkey also pressed for sustainable financing for the Palestinian Authority, the source said, adding that Israel is freezing Palestinian revenues as a method of exerting pressure.

CNN has asked the Israeli government for comment on those claims.

Turkey also criticized the low level of international aid, saying: “What is being done under the name of aid to Palestinians is similar to keeping a tortured person barely alive with an IV.”

An Israeli strike in Rafah that left dozens of civilians dead is "heartbreaking," a National Security Council spokesperson said on Monday, adding the US was "actively engaging" with officials in Israel to determine what precisely happened.

The official added that the US is actively engaged with Israel Defense Forces on the ground "to assess what happened,and understand that the IDF is conducting an investigation."

Here's what we know: At least 45 people were killed and 200 were wounded in anIsraeli strikeon a camp for displaced people inRafahon Sunday, according to Gazan authorities. The Israeli military claimed it struck a Hamas compound in the area,killing two senior officialsfrom the militant group.

Remember: The US has repeatedly warned Israel against a large-scale ground invasion of Rafah without a plan to protect the million-plus civilians who are sheltering there.

Speaking following a visit to Israel last week, US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said he had detected “refinements” to Israel’s plan, which he said was now more “targeted and limited” in scale.

US President Joe Biden has said he would not provide heavy bombs to Israel in support of a Rafah operation, but has recently approved a $1 billion military aid package that includes tank ammunition and mortar rounds.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it is investigating the airstrike that killed dozens of people in Rafah on Sunday, according to Gazan authorities.

In a statement Monday, the IDF said its General Staff's Fact-Finding and Assessment Mechanism had launched an investigation into the "circ*mstances of the deaths of civilians in the area of the strike."

The mechanism is an independent body responsible for examining allegations of misconduct in conflict. Military Advocate General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi ordered the investigation to be carried out, the IDF said.

Some background: At least 45 people were killed and 200 wounded after the strike hit a camp for displaced people, according the government media office in Gaza.

The IDF said the attack was conducted based on “prior intelligence” indicating that senior officials of Hamas’s West Bank wing were present at the site, and that it had assessed there would be "no expected harm to civilians."

Palestinians with disabilities in Gaza fear they will be killed first because of limited opportunities to flee due to their impairment, the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons and Disabilities (CRPD) said in a release on Monday.

Among the examples cited was that of a 14-year-old girl with cerebral palsy who had lost her assistive devices, including a wheelchair, and had to be carried by her parents while fleeing from the north of Gaza to the south amid Israel's offensive.

At one point, the girl told her family: "Leave me here, and you run away," the committee said. The girl survived but is at risk of being displaced again, it added.

The CPRD called for an immediate ceasefire and underscored the obligation to the Convention on the Rights of Persons and Disabilities, which calls for all necessary measures to ensure the protection and safety of people with disabilities in situations of risk, including in armed conflict.

CNN has previously reported on the struggles of disabled Palestinians in Gaza. Read more here.