- LATEST DEVELOPMENTS:
- Israel says it is targeting a “specific area” of a hospital
- Army spokesman calls Al Shifa “a central hub” of Hamas operations, “perhaps even the beating heart and perhaps even a focal point”
- Medical teams and Arabic speakers are part of the Israeli operation
- Hamas says it holds Israel and the US president fully responsible
GAZA, Nov 15 (Portal) – The Israeli military said it carried out a raid on Hamas militants at Al-Shifa hospital on Wednesday after calling on them to surrender, with thousands of Palestinian civilians still in the largest hospital in the Gaza Strip.
Dr. Munir al-Bursh, director general of Gaza’s Health Ministry, told Al Jazeera television that Israeli forces had raided the western side of the medical complex.
“There were large explosions and dust entered the areas where we are. We believe there was an explosion at the hospital,” Bursh said.
Less than an hour earlier, around 1 a.m. local time (2300 GMT), a spokesman for Gaza’s health ministry said Israel had told officials in the enclave that it would raid the Shifa hospital complex “in the coming minutes.”
Calls for a humanitarian ceasefire have been heard around the world in recent days, and the fate of Al Shifa has become an international focus due to deteriorating conditions at the facility, where thousands of patients, medical staff and displaced people were trapped during the Israeli onslaught Concerns have risen in Gaza over the last five weeks.
Israel has said Hamas has a command center under Al Shifa and uses the hospital and tunnels below to conceal military operations and hold hostages. Hamas denies this.
In a statement, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said: “Based on intelligence and operational necessity, IDF forces are conducting a precise and targeted operation against Hamas in a specific area in Shifa Hospital.”
The military added: “IDF forces include medical teams and Arabic speakers who have undergone special training to prepare for this complex and sensitive environment, with the intention that no harm is caused to civilians.”
Israeli army spokesman Lt. Col. Peter Lerner told CNN that for Hamas the hospital and compound are “a central hub of its operations, perhaps even the beating heart and perhaps even a focal point.”
The US said on Tuesday that its own intelligence service supported Israel’s conclusions.
Hamas said on Wednesday that the US announcement effectively gave Israel a “green light” to raid the hospital. The group said it held Israel and US President Joe Biden fully responsible for the operation. There was no immediate comment from the White House. Biden was scheduled to speak at a fundraiser a few hours after the raid.
Over the past 10 days, Israeli forces have fought fierce street battles against Hamas militants before advancing into central Gaza City and the Al Shifa area.
Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas in retaliation for the militants’ cross-border attack on Israel on October 7. Israel says Hamas killed 1,200 people and took more than 240 hostage in the rampage.
In the West Bank, a separate Palestinian enclave not controlled by Hamas, Palestinian Authority Health Minister Mai Alkaila said that Israel was “committing a new crime against humanity, medical personnel and patients by sieging” Al Shifa. .
“We hold the occupation forces fully responsible for the lives of medical staff, patients and displaced people in Al Shifa,” Alkaila said in a statement.
TERRIBLE CONDITIONS
Al Shifa is a sprawling complex of buildings and courtyards just a few hundred meters from Gaza City’s fishing port. Buildings on the western side of the complex, which the Gaza official said was the scene of the raid, include the internal medicine and dialysis departments.
According to Hamas, 650 patients and 5,000 to 7,000 other civilians are trapped on the hospital grounds and are under constant fire from Israeli snipers and drones. Due to fuel, water and supply shortages, 40 patients have died in the last few days.
Thirty-six babies remain from the neonatal unit after three died. With no fuel for the generators that power the incubators, the babies were kept as warm as possible and lined up eight to a bed.
Palestinians trapped in the hospital dug a mass grave to bury deceased patients on Tuesday, and there was no plan to evacuate babies despite Israel announcing an offer to send portable incubators, Gaza Health Ministry spokesman Ashraf Al-Qidra said.
Qidra said there were about 100 bodies rotting inside and there was no way to get them out.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is deeply disturbed by the “dramatic loss of life” in hospitals, his spokesman said. “In the name of humanity, the secretary-general calls for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire,” the spokesman told reporters.
Medical officials in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip say more than 11,000 people have died in Israeli attacks, about 40% of them children, and countless others were trapped under rubble.
Around two-thirds of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have become homeless and unable to leave the area, where food, fuel, fresh water and medical supplies are in short supply.
INTERNATIONAL RIGHT
Israel’s move toward Shifa Hospital raises questions about how it would interpret international laws protecting medical facilities and the thousands of displaced people seeking refuge there, U.N. human rights officials said.
Hospitals are protected buildings under international humanitarian law. But allegations that Shifa was also being used for military purposes complicated the situation because it also violated international law, U.N. officials said.
Medical units that are used to carry out actions that are harmful to the enemy and have ignored requests to refrain from doing so lose their special protection under international law.
Israel said in its statement on Wednesday that it had given Gaza authorities 12 hours to stop military activity inside the hospital. “Unfortunately, this is not the case,” the military statement said.
Omar Shakir, Human Rights Watch’s Israel and Palestine director, said before the Israeli raid that the warning of an attack should give civilians a safe place to stay and a safe way to get there.
“It is very alarming because you have to remember that there are tens of thousands of displaced people in hospitals in Gaza,” he said.
Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza, Trevor Hunnicutt in San Francisco, Ahmed Tolba in Cairo and Portal offices; Writing by Cynthia Osterman; Edited by Howard Goller and Simon Cameron-Moore
Our standards: The Thomson Portal Trust Principles.
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