A department head at Al-Chifa Hospital in Gaza announced on Thursday the arrest of the director of the facility, which is currently under the control of the Israeli army, which says it is searching for Hamas military facilities there.
• Also read: Israeli army takes media to tour tunnels under Al-Shifa Hospital
• Also read: Gaza: A health “tragedy” is looming, according to Unicef.
“Doctor Mohammed Abou Salmiya has been arrested,” said Dr. Khaled Abou Samra told AFP. “Two nurses and another doctor were arrested,” a health ministry official told the Palestinian Islamist movement.
Al-Chifa was once presented by Israel as the main command center for Hamas operations in the Gaza Strip. For days, their soldiers have been searching the facility, the largest in the small Palestinian territory, room by room.
Several doctors told AFP that during these searches they were personally escorted away by Israeli soldiers, which usually ended with the detonation of explosives on the ground floor and basement floors of the hospital.
Images of the evacuation of Al-Khifa on November 18 went around the world. More than 2,300 patients, staff and displaced people were gathered there before having to leave in dramatic conditions, except for the sick and injured who could not be transported.
Premature babies in particular could not be removed immediately and had to undergo special surgery the next day to be taken to Egypt.
Doctor Abou Salmiya, whose place of detention was not disclosed on Thursday, told AFP he had received an “order” to evacuate his hospital. The Israeli army, for its part, claimed it evacuated it at the “request” of the establishment’s head.
The Israeli army has now released an audio recording of a conversation between Dr. Abu Salmiya and a high-ranking Israeli officer, in which the two men blame each other for the evacuation request.
The Israeli army has already announced that it has found a 55-meter-long tunnel under Al-Chifa that is “used for terrorism.” It also released video surveillance images that its spokesman said proved that hostages were being held there. Hamas responded that they had been taken there for treatment.
In a statement on Thursday, the Palestinian Islamist movement, which has been in power in Gaza since 2007, “strongly condemned” his arrest and that of his colleagues.
“We call on the International Committee of the Red Cross and international organizations to advocate for their immediate release.”