North Gaza hospitals ‘out of service’ as Israeli attacks continue
Palestinian Territories – AFP
The hospitals in the centre of the heaviest north Gaza fighting have been forced out of service amid shortages and combat, the health ministry said Monday, adding the number of patients dying in the biggest medical centre had risen.
UN agencies and doctors inside the facility warned the effects of the raging battles were claiming the lives of civilians including infants.
Deputy health minister Youssef Abu Rish said six premature babies had died in the hospital, Gaza’s biggest, along with nine other patients in intensive care due to the lack of electricity.
Abu Rish told AFP all hospitals in the north of the embattled territory were “out of service”.
The UN’s humanitarian agency said previously that 20 of Gaza’s 36 hospitals have been disabled.
“Regrettably, the hospital is not functioning as a hospital anymore,” said WHO director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, after contacting on-the-ground staff inside the Al-Shifa complex.
“It’s been three days without electricity, without water,” he said, describing the plight of those trapped inside as “dire and perilous”.
Israel is facing intense international pressure to minimise civilian suffering amid its massive air and ground operation, which Hamas authorities say have killed 11,180 people, including 4,609 children.
Israel said 44 of its troops have been killed.
Flags flew at half-mast at United Nations compounds across Asia on Monday, as staff observed a minute’s silence in memory of colleagues killed in Gaza during Israel’s war against Palestine.
Israel’s military said it would observe a “self-evacuation corridor” Monday, allowing people to move from Al-Shifa southward, but admitted the area was still the scene of “intense battles”.
The area of fighting “currently includes the area surrounding the Shifa hospital but not the hospital itself”, a spokesperson for Israeli military said.
The Israeli army also said its ground soldiers had hand-delivered 300 litres (80 gallons) of fuel near the hospital “for urgent medical purposes”.
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