International outrage over the dire condition of Gaza hospitals

Gaza’s medical system is on its knees: Israeli bombardment of the Al Shifa facility, the largest facility in the country’s northern strip, TELAVIV

TEL AVIV, Israel —Israel’s military pressed ahead Saturday with a campaign to force the evacuation of hospitals in the northern Gaza Strip so it can pursue Hamas militants it believes are taking cover there.

An airstrike just outside the hospital killed more than a dozen people. Hamas members were trying to get out of the hospital in an ambulance.

The increased pressure from the Israeli military on Gaza’s hospitals to evacuate over the past two days has further stressed an overtaxed medical system in the besieged area.

Israel’s military said it surrounded Al Rantisi and told everyone to leave, including staff, patients and civilians sheltering on the hospital grounds. The military said Hamas fighters were also present and tried to prevent civilians from leaving. But eventually many civilians left, the military said — many by foot, some by ambulance. The military in Israel said that it killed a person who held more than 1000 people hostage.

The World Health Organization’s Director-General said Gaza’s medical system is “on its knees” because of Israel’s bombardment.

The WHO director-general said that the organization had documented five hospital attacks in a single day in Gaza. Half of Gaza’s 36 hospitals and two-thirds of the territory’s primary health care centers are no longer functioning, he added.

Several hospitals were directly hit by the intensified Israeli bombardments as of Friday, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

By Saturday, Al Shifa hospital, the largest such facility in Gaza, had lost power, forcing a shutdown of services requiring electricity, according to Palestinian health officials in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip. The Ministry of Health said its intensive care and pediatric departments and the oxygen equipment stopped working.

Several videos shared online by witnesses showed people injured in a courtyard that is part of the Al Shifa Complex, which has also served as a shelter for the displaced and injured since the Israeli incursion began.

Hospitals in Gaza need to be stopped from being destroyed. The lives of thousands of civilians, patients and medical staff are at risk,” said William Schomburg, head of International Committee of the Red Cross’ sub-delegation in Gaza.

The director of the Al Shifa Medical Complex stated that the situation facing hospitals was tragic.

Doctors Without Borders released a memo from a doctor inside the Al-ShiFA Hospital saying the lives of many babies are in danger because of the lack of power to generators.

“We had two neonatal patients die actually because the incubator is not working because there is no electricity,” Obeid said. “So the situation is very, very bad. We need help.

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For a month, Israel has not allowed any fuel to enter Gaza. Israeli officials have stated that the military is still fighting with Hamas near hospitals in the Gaza Strip but that Al-Shifa isn’t under siege.

Those who do manage to evacuate still face Israeli airstrikes in southern Gaza, where the United Nations says its shelters have only one shower for 700 people.

The US tried to stop Israel from reoccupying Gaza. The U.S envisions a Palestinian government in both Gaza and the Israeli-occupied West Bank as a step towards statehood, according to the Secretary of State.

The Palestinian Health Ministry reports more than 11,000 people in Gaza have been killed in Israeli military operations since the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel that killed about 1,200 people.