Good evening.
Since October 7, our staff in Ottawa and missions on the ground in Tel Aviv, Ramallah, Amman, Cairo, Beirut and Athens have been responding to and assisting Canadians, permanent residents and their immediate families.
Since the last briefing to this committee on October 23, a number of developments on Canada's consular and emergency response have happened, and I am pleased to update you today.
The recent pause mentioned by my colleague also entailed a suspension of the daily movement of foreign nationals out of Gaza, including Canadians, but these movements of foreign nationals have since resumed. Close to 150 Canadians, permanent residents and their immediate family members have left Gaza since Saturday. I'm pleased to report that another seven left Gaza today. Overall, that's over 600 Canadian PRs and immediate family members who have been able to leave Gaza since November 1.
Canada's efforts support one of the largest ongoing operations in Gaza to evacuate foreign nationals, by the numbers. Only Egypt, Jordan, Russia and the United States have evacuated more of their nationals than Canada. We've evacuated more people than any other European country. In terms of our interactions with Canadians, we've received over 15,000 calls.
Behind those numbers, most importantly, are the people we're helping. My team members and their colleagues across the network are proud of the work they're doing even though it's often difficult, and they celebrate every successful evacuation from Gaza.
The last briefing of this committee was on October 23, which also coincided with the last scheduled assisted departure flight from Tel Aviv, which brought us to a total of 1,661 assisted departures by air.
Turning to the West Bank, we've also supported assisted departure options from the West Bank for close to 80 people into Jordan.
With respect to the Gaza Strip, the Rafah crossing is the only way out of Gaza. Since November 1, over 600 Canadian permanent residents and their immediate family members have been able to leave Gaza. Our team in Cairo is in position every day, waiting on the other side of the border crossing to welcome citizens, permanent residents and their family members who manage to get out. They're there to offer them essential goods, transport them to Cairo, procure medical assistance if necessary, provide consular assistance and help with documents, and provide any other support needed depending on the circumstances.
About 200 Canadians still in the Gaza Strip have asked us to help them get out. We are working very hard to make that happen. It's a complex operation. Just getting to Rafah takes considerable effort. People first have to get permission from local authorities. Ultimately, we have no control over who is allowed to leave Gaza or who is allowed to enter Egypt. We know that all of our nationals are coping with extremely difficult situations, and we are doing everything in our power to help them get out.
As in all other crises of this kind, our emergency response and evacuation efforts are focused on Canadians, permanent residents and their family members, as defined in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. Because of that definition, Canada has one of the largest contingents of evacuees in Gaza.
I'm happy to answer your questions.
Thank you.