4:08 p.m. ET, November 5, 2023
IDF reportedly releases evidence that Hamas is using civilian infrastructure to carry out attacks
By CNN’s Stephanie Halasz On November 5, rockets are fired from Gaza toward Israel. Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu/Getty Images
The Israeli Defense Forces have reportedly released evidence that Hamas is using civilian infrastructure, including hospitals and children’s playgrounds, as a shield for its attacks on Israel.
Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military’s chief spokesman, claimed during a news conference on Sunday that the Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza was being used by Hamas, among others, as a shield against Israel’s response to its rockets.
Hagari showed aerial photos of the hospital and pointed out rocket launchers nearby.
“Only 75 meters, 80 meters to the hospital. Here the IDF identified a launch pad, which means it fired rockets from here,” Hagari claimed, accusing the Palestinian militant movement of placing launch pads there knowing that Israeli airstrikes on these targets would damage the hospital.
Hagari also showed aerial photos of a tunnel opening at Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani Hospital.
“A tunnel used for terrorist infrastructure in the Qatari hospital. As if that wasn’t enough… the terrorists are also shooting at our soldiers from the hospital,” Hagari claimed.
Earlier on Sunday, the IDF said it had identified “launching pits” and “rocket launchers at an old children’s playground in the Gaza Strip.”
The IDF included a late-night video that purportedly showed four rocket launch tubes “just five meters from a children’s swimming pool.”
A CNN security expert who reviewed the footage said it appeared to show what the IDF claimed.
Palestinian officials deny claims: Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority Health Minister Mai Al-Kaila dismissed the Israeli military’s claims, saying Israel wanted to “create pretexts for attacks on (hospitals).”
“Israel is always making excuses and inventing theories and lies to legitimize its plans and actions,” she told CNN.
The head of the Hamas-controlled government media office in Gaza, Salama Marouf, also rejected the claims in a press conference on Sunday evening outside Al-Shifa Hospital.
“(Israel) is carrying out hospital massacres,” he said, as ambulances behind him brought injured people for treatment. “In the last hour there have been extensive airstrikes near hospitals in the Gaza Strip.”
Some background information: The IDF made the allegations against Hamas after strongly criticizing the spate of attacks against the densely populated enclave, which is home to more than two million Palestinians.
Israel began its war against Hamas after the militant group killed about 1,400 people in Israel in a surprise attack last month. According to Israel, more than 200 people are still being held captive.
Israel’s more than 11,000 attacks in Gaza since then have damaged civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, United Nations shelters and refugee camps, and killed and injured civilians. According to Dr. Mai Al-Kaila, the Palestinian health minister in Ramallah, said more than 9,700 people have been killed in Israeli air strikes on Gaza since October 7, citing data from medical sources in the Hamas-controlled enclave.
The IDF says it is targeting Hamas leaders, fighters and infrastructure.
Regarding the evacuations in the Gaza Strip: Hagari also accused Hamas of trying to prevent civilians from fleeing to the south of the Gaza Strip, as the IDF had demanded. He said that “corridors” recently established by Israel for the safe passage of evacuated civilians had to be closed because of Hamas attacks in the region.
Hagari said over 1.5 million multi-colored leaflets were dropped in the Gaza Strip to signal various messages.
More than 19,734 telephone calls were made warning people to leave certain areas and over six million recorded messages were sent in Arabic urging civilians to evacuate south.
A U.S. special envoy to the Middle East, David Satterfield, said on Saturday that between 800,000 and a million people had fled the north for southern parts of the Gaza Strip, deepening the humanitarian crisis. During Israel’s siege of the territory, critical supplies remain in short supply and the IDF has attacked targets south of the evacuation line.
CNN’s Kareem El Damanhoury, Abeer Salman and Kareem Khadder contributed to this story.
This post has been updated with response from Hamas and Palestinian Authority officials.