A horrifying video shows the utter devastation wreaked on Gaza’s largest hospital last night. Blood-soaked sheets cover the sea of victims of a violent explosion as eyewitnesses say the “smell of corpses” is now in the air.
Hundreds were killed when a huge fireball described as “hellish” ripped through al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City at 7pm on Tuesday evening, leaving a bloodbath in its wake.
There continues to be heated debate about the cause of the explosion. A blame game is ensuing between Hamas and Israel as the terrorists claim the explosion was the result of an Israeli airstrike, while the IDF blames Islamic Jihad militants for a misfired rocket.
Now a heavily muzzled video has emerged showing bodies piling up outside the hospital, some barely hidden in the darkness, as the war-torn Gaza Strip runs out of body bags.
Web shows the graphic images, which were also shared by the BBC and other broadcasters, to show the extent of the destruction at the hospital, where Palestine said at least 500 people were killed last night.
Today, desperate and shocked relatives are forced to search through piles of corpses to identify their loved ones, and traumatized health workers have had no choice but to continue treating the patients left behind.
***WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT***
Now a heavily muzzled video has emerged showing bodies piling up outside the hospital
An injured Palestinian is carried away from Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital after it was hit in Gaza City
Pictured: The burning hospital building after the strike on Tuesday evening
Blood-soaked sheets cover victims of a violent explosion overnight
The devastated family members must now come to terms with the unspeakable loss of their loved ones in the hospital explosion
The wrapped bodies of the victims who died in a nighttime explosion are transported away in the back of trucks
Stunned crowds gathered to witness the reckless destruction of the health facility
People gather to mourn the many victims of last night’s hospital attack
Children sit in the back of an ambulance at Shifa Hospital after a massive explosion that Palestine blames on Israeli airstrikes rocked the facility
A woman reacts while holding a pillow while standing amid rubble outside the grounds of Ahli Arab Hospital
While doctors at the hospital treated patients who thought they were safe from Israeli airstrikes, a massive explosion devastated a place where the sick were supposed to be healed.
“People ran into the surgical ward shouting, ‘Help us, help us, people are being killed and injured in the hospital!'” said Dr. Fadel Naim, head of the orthopedic surgery department at the hospital where he had just had an operation, was about to start a new one when the explosion hit.
“The hospital was full of dead and wounded, dismembered bodies and corpses,” he said.
“We tried to save everyone who could be saved, but the number was too large for the hospital team to save… We saw them alive, but we could not help them and they were martyred.”
Not only did the explosion kill hundreds of people, but many others had their existing injuries worsened, while the already overcrowded hospital is now inundated with new patients injured as a result of the explosion.
Wounded Palestinians wait for treatment at al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, central Gaza Strip, after arriving from al-Ahli hospital following an explosion on Tuesday
On Tuesday, wounded Palestinian children lay in Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City
People react in the area of Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City on October 18, 2023, where hundreds of Palestinians were killed in an explosion for which Israeli and Palestinian officials blamed each other
Israel on Tuesday denied responsibility for the explosion at Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City, claiming it was a misfired rocket fired by Islamic Jihad terrorists in Palestine
A Palestinian medic carries a child injured in an airstrike at Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza, on Tuesday
Crying and injured Palestinians were taken to Al-Shifa Hospital after the explosion at Al’Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza
An injured boy was taken to doctors after an explosion at a hospital in Gaza
Palestinian children were among the many killed and injured
People gather around the bodies of Palestinians killed in the explosion at Ahli Arab Hospital in central Gaza after they were transported to Al-Shifa Hospital
“They are all in a terrible situation,” said Mohammed Abu Selmia.
“A young woman whose limbs were amputated, a child whose intestines came out, many others had limb amputations, bleeding in the brain, bleeding in the liver and spleen.”
Ghassan Abu Sittah, a doctor with the medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) who was treating patients at the time of the explosion, said: “We were operating in the hospital. “There was a strong explosion and the ceiling fell on the operating room.”
“Hospitals are not a destination,” he said. “This bloodshed must stop. ‘Enough is enough.’
Meanwhile, other doctors and locals were photographed searching the area around the hospital for more bodies, with the death toll potentially rising.
A Palestinian man carries an elderly woman past the site of a deadly explosion at al-Ahli hospital
The bodies of those killed in the hospital explosion are piling up in Gaza
After the explosion, a family’s belongings are scattered on the ground in front of the hospital
Civilians collect belongings among vehicle wreckage after Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital was hit
Images after the explosion showed the shell of a burned-out car and severe damage to buildings
Children collect pillows and other items from vehicle wreckage outside the facility
People stand next to the bodies of victims of an explosion at Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza
“There are dead bodies in the streets. “The buildings are collapsing on their residents,” said Jamil Abdullah, a Palestinian Swede hoping to escape the blockaded enclave.
“The smell of the dead is everywhere.”
According to observers, Gaza has run out of body bags and the corpses filling hospital floors need to be wrapped in other materials.
Additional footage shows people’s belongings, including what appear to be clothing and children’s backpacks, scattered among smoking rubble and burned-out cars.
The carnage is also clearly visible in the chapel of the Christian-run hospital, where pews and other objects were thrown around by the force of the explosion.
Ambulances and private cars brought about 350 victims of the explosion in al-Ahli to Gaza City’s main hospital, al-Shifa, which was already overflowing with wounded from other attacks, its director Mohammed Abu Selmia said.
“We squeeze five beds into one tiny room. “We need equipment, we need medicine, we need beds, we need everything,” Abu Selmia said, warning that fuel supplies for the hospital’s generators would run out on Wednesday.
“I think the medical sector in Gaza will collapse within a few hours.”
At a news conference in al-Shifa, doctors stood amid a sea of dead children brought from the stricken hospital, holding some of their faces up to the cameras to show the horror that had befallen them.
Israel has launched 11 days of deadly attacks on the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip in retaliation for the killing of 1,400 people who were shot, mutilated or burned in shock Hamas cross-border attacks on October 7.
After the explosion, scenes of carnage were photographed next to a children’s playground near the hospital
Distraught locals gather in the area of Al-Ahli Hospital, where hundreds of Palestinians were killed
A little girl carries her belongings away from the site of the deadly hospital explosion in Gaza City last night
Crying women sat on the floor of Al-Shifa Hospital after an explosion killed and injured many fellow Palestinians
Despite the uncertainty over what caused the explosion at the Christian-run Ahli Arab Hospital, there was swift and widespread international condemnation.
The head of the World Health Organization issued a stark warning today, saying the situation in Gaza is “spinning out of control” while demanding that “violence on all sides cease” so that Israel’s siege is lifted and medical supplies are allowed into the Gaza Strip can become enclave.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said “responsibility for this crime must be made clear” and the “perpetrators must be held accountable.”
European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen told EU lawmakers that “facts must be established” and that “all those responsible must be held to account.”
She described the overnight explosion as a “hell of fire” and said: “We must redouble our efforts to protect citizens from the fury of war.”
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for an “immediate humanitarian ceasefire” and warned Israel against “collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”
Those injured in the explosion, which killed more than 500 people, were taken to another hospital in Gaza
A Palestinian woman and her son had bloodstains on their faces as they sat on the hospital floor after the explosion
An injured man is admitted to Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City after he was injured in an explosion at Al-Ahli Hospital on Tuesday
The scene of destruction at Al-Ahli Hospital following an explosion in Gaza City on Tuesday. Israeli and Hamas terrorists have blamed each other for the explosion
Children injured in the hospital strike cry as they are treated at Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza, on Tuesday
People inspect the area of Al-Ahli Hospital, where hundreds of Palestinians were killed in an explosion that Israeli and Palestinian officials blamed each other for on Wednesday
From Tripoli to Tehran, there was an angry reaction across the Muslim world.
Protesters in Jordan – home to millions of Palestinian refugees – tried to storm the Israeli embassy.
In Lebanon, clashes broke out between demonstrators and security forces in front of the US embassy. Stones were thrown and a building was set on fire.
The US State Department authorized the departure of “some non-emergency” personnel from the embassy in Beirut, citing the “unpredictable security situation.”
Hezbollah, Lebanon’s powerful Iran-backed militant group, announced a “Day of Rage” on Wednesday.
The Gaza Health Ministry said 2,778 Palestinians were killed and 9,700 injured. That was before the explosion at al-Ahli Arab Hospital on Tuesday evening.
An additional 1,200 people are believed to be buried alive or dead under the rubble across Gaza. According to Israel, more than 1,400 people were killed in Israel and at least 199 others, including children, were captured by Hamas and taken to Gaza.
Increasing bombings near towns in the southern Gaza Strip where Israel had sought refuge for civilians are unsettling those gathered there.
Thousands of people trying to flee Gaza have gathered in Rafah, home to the territory’s only border crossing with Egypt. Negotiators are pushing for a deal to let aid in and let refugees with foreign passports out.
A view of the damage after the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza City was hit
Debris and people’s belongings are left behind in a children’s playground
The Palestinians look helplessly at the destruction around them
The ground is littered with bags and belongings of people who tried to get to safety during the explosion
The explosion killed more than 500 people and left a trail of destruction