OTTAWA – Israel has concluded its military did not commit a criminal act when it killed a Canadian and six other aid workers in Gaza two years ago.
The decision prompted outrage in Australia, where the foreign minister has summoned the Israeli ambassador, but so far Canada has not reacted to the report that was issued Wednesday.
Israel’s military prosecutor said it had decided against a criminal investigation into April 2024 airstrikes that hit a convoy of World Central Kitchen vehicles. The strikes killed Jacob Flickinger, a military veteran from Quebec, along with a Palestinian, and aid workers from the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States.
The aid group, which distributes food in Gaza, said at the time it had co-ordinated with the military over the convoy’s movement. The vehicles, which had the group’s logo on their roofs visible from the air, were left incinerated and mangled.
Wednesday’s military statement said individuals in the vehicles were mistakenly identified as armed Hamas operatives. But it concluded that the commanders’ decisions “did not raise reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct.” At the time, two officers were removed from their positions and three others reprimanded.
World Central Kitchen responded in a statement saying the military’s account of the strike was untrue, “conflates different timelines and events, muddies the story and shifts the blame.” It called for an independent investigation.
The Canadian Press has reached out for comment from Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand, who has not yet made a public statement reacting to the case.
Australia’s foreign minister Penny Wong said the removals and reprimands of officers weren’t sufficient accountability for the killing of Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom.
“This is despite Israel Defense Forces admissions that the IDF strikes on Zomi and her colleagues’ vehicles were the result of serious failures to follow IDF procedures, mistaken identification and errors in decision-making,” says a statement from Wong posted on the Australian government website.
She said the decision was “especially insulting’ because it was announced on World Humanitarian Day.
“I will call in Israel’s Ambassador to Australia Hillel Newman and have directed Australia’s Ambassador to Israel to convey our views directly to Israel as the Australian Government considers next steps,” Wong said.
The Israeli military also announced Wednesday it had decided not to take criminal action over the killings of four staffers from Doctors Without Borders in two separate instances in November 2023 and February 2024.
Following the deaths of the World Central Kitchen workers in 2024, then-prime minister Justin Trudeau called for a probe beyond the Israeli military itself.
“We need a fully open, transparent, independent and rapid investigation into what happened,” he said at an event in Winnipeg.
Trudeau also strongly pushed back on a suggestion by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at that time, that collateral deaths are a normal part of war.
“It shouldn’t just happen when you have aid workers for an extraordinary organization like World Central Kitchen, risking their lives every day in an incredibly dangerous place, to deliver food to people who are experiencing a horrific humanitarian catastrophe,” Trudeau said.
Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East wrote Wednesday that Prime Minister Mark Carney’s silence on the findings could “allow Israel to get away with the murder of a Canadian aid worker, with no consequences.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 20, 2026.
— With files from The Associated Press
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