Anthony Albanese declares Israel’s explanation over the killing of aid workers ‘not good enough’

Israel’s explanation of a missile air strike that killed an Australian aid worker has been criticised by the Prime Minister.

Anthony Albanese has made one his strongest statements on the death of an Australian aid worker in Gaza to date, declaring Israel’s claims that a fatal air strike that killed seven charity workers was a product of war was “not good enough.”

The family of a Melbourne-born aid worker killed in Gaza has called for Israeli soldiers to be investigated for war crimes after seven people were killed when their charity convoy took fire in central Gaza on Monday night.

The Prime Minister said Israel had breached international law and warned his government would work in “whatever way possible” to ensure transparency in Israel’s promised full investigation into the incident.

“We need to have accountability for how it has occurred and what is not good enough is the statement that has been made that this is just a product of war,” Mr Albanese told reporters.

“This is against humanitarian law. International humanitarian law makes it very clear that aid workers should be able to provide that aid and that assistance free of the threat of losing their life.”

Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom was killed by an Israeli strike. Picture: Supplied.

Seven aid workers with World Central Kitchen were killed in the Gaza Strip when their convoy came under fire on Monday night. The group were delivering food supplies for the charity organisation, which was founded by US celebrity chef Jose Andres and has been delivered millions of meals to civilians in Gaza.

After speaking to his Israeli counterpart on Wednesday, Mr Albanese said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had accepted responsibility for the incident but said the full details of the tragedy remain unclear.

“We need a full, transparent and clear explanation for how this occurred. People would have seen the footage of the vehicle that was hit in this strike by an Israeli missile that clearly is identified as being from the World Central Kitchen,” he told ABC earlier.

“These vehicles were going about carrying the best of humanity. People who have come from all over the world to help Palestinians who are suffering from extraordinary deprivation in Gaza, and for them to lose their lives is outrageous and completely unacceptable.”

Meanwhile, several members of the Coalition have come forward to suggest that the missile strike was a mistake.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said “mistakes do happen in war” and said he would not prejudge the findings of Israel’s investigation.

“This should not have happened and it is a terrible and tragic mistake, and of course Australia should make its views known. This is part of a tragedy that goes all the way to October 7,” he said.

Nationals leader David Littleproud said that Australia “needed to be careful” in the way it navigated calls for a war crime investigation into the killings of aid workers in Gaza.

“We need to understand this is a war zone, it’s a situation where you can’t control the situation entirely,” he told Sky.

“I appreciate these people are brave and selfless … but they are going into a war zone and it’s not a controlled environment, and mistakes will happen.”

The Israeli military has claimed that an initial investigation into the strike found its forces had wrongly identified the charity vehicles as hostile targets. In a video statement released on Tuesday night, Mr Netanyahu said Israel “deeply regrets the tragic incident.”

After Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez called Israel’s response “insufficient” in an interview on Wednesday, Mr Albanese said he agreed with his Spanish counterpart and called for the Netanyahu government to publish a “full and transparent investigation” into the attack.

Anthony Albanese is seeking answers from Israel. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

“One of the things that Israel says is that it is protecting people’s lives, innocent people, well, this stands in stark contrast as well as of course the many incidents affecting not just people who have come from overseas to provide aid but of course Palestinians themselves where we’ve seen an extraordinary loss of lives in Gaza,” Mr Albanese said.

“And for Israel to be continuing to assert that it will have a ground invasion of Rafa has led to the international community expressing our extreme concern leading to the United Nations Security Council making the extraordinary resolution that they did just a week ago that was of course not vetoed by the United States.”

More than 30,000 people have been killed in the war since Hamas gunman launched an attack on southern Israel on October 7, killing about 1200 people and taking 253 hostages.

A recent report endorsed by the UN said famine was imminent in northern Gaza, where 70 per cent of the population is on the brink of starvation.