-- Eight Canadians, including several children, are dead after an Israeli air raid on a Lebanese town near the Israel border, CanWest News Service has confirmed. Six others are said to be in critical condition.
All eight were from Montreal and are members of the same family, CanWest has learned. Four of those killed were children between ages one and eight.
Canada is trying to evacuate the thousands of residents currently in Lebanon, as conflict and violence with Israel heightens to new levels. There are 16,000 Canadians are registered as being in Lebanon. But officials believe as many as 40,000 Canadians are currently in Lebanon. Canada has a large population of people of Lebanese descent. The federal government has warned against travel to the country and is advising those in Lebanon to stay indoors, limit their movement and ensure their passports and other vital information are up-to-date.
Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay said on Sunday that Canadians who want to leave Lebanon will be evacuated by ship and possibly helicopter. He called for restraint on all sides in the Middle East.
The Group of Eight Nations meeting this weekend in St. Petersburg, Russia, have condemned the extremists who triggered the violence in the Middle East. The G-8 leaders, which includes Prime Minister Stephen Harper, urged the Lebanese government to secure its territory where Hezbollah gunmen are operating and said Israel should release the Palestinian officials it holds captive.
Harper has been singled out as taking a particularly hard stance against Lebanon, breaking the country’s tradition as being relatively even-handed toward Israel and Middle East countries. On Friday, he said Israel's response was “measured” and that it had the right to defend itself.
The death toll since the conflict began last week is more than 100 in Lebanon and 15 in Israel. The violence was triggered after the Hezbollah militant guerilla group kidnapped two Israeli soldiers and eight others in a cross-border raid. Since then, Israel has bombed the Beirut airport as well as roads that link Lebanon to the outside world. In return, Lebanon has launched missiles at Israeli cities.
Israel accused Iran of providing help to Lebanon so they could fire a missile that hit an Israeli ship. But both Hezbollah and Iran have denied such accusations.
On Sunday, Lebanon's prime minister said he might send his army to take control of southern Lebanon from Hezbollah, which some fear could spark civil war.
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