Gaza’s largest hospital is ‘not functioning’ amid the Israeli assault. According to the president of the World Health Organization (WHO), as the intense Israeli bombardment on the Hamas-controlled strip continues, the central hospital in Gaza has shut down, and patient deaths are on the rise.
Medical professionals report that three infants have died and that additional children are in danger of dying from power outages as a result of the intense fighting taking place close by at the hospitals in the northern part of the Palestinian enclave, including the al-Shifa complex, which is barely able to provide for its residents due to Israeli forces’ blockade.
Targeting Palestinian Hamas terrorists who carried out lethal strikes in southern Israel on October 7, Israel claims the organization maintains command centers beneath and close to the hospitals.
Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that the WHO was able to talk with medical personnel in al-Shifa, who reported a “dire and perilous” scenario with ongoing gunfire and bombing aggravating the already dire condition.
In a message on X, the former Twitter, he stated that “tragically, the number of patient fatalities has increased significantly” and that al-Shifa was “not functioning as a hospital anymore.”
Tedros called for a rapid ceasefire, as did other high-ranking U.N. officials.
“The world cannot stand silent while hospitals, which should be safe havens, are transformed into scenes of death, devastation, and despair,” he stated. In addition to calling for a truce, the president of Indonesia, the country with the largest Muslim population in the world, met with U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday in Washington.
In a video released following his participation in an Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) meeting in Riyadh, President Joko Widodo stated, “A ceasefire must be implemented soon; we also must accelerate and increase the amount of humanitarian aid; and we must begin peace negotiations.”
He claimed that, in light of the Palestinian people’s suffering, the world appeared “helpless.” The International Criminal Court was also asked to look into “war crimes and crimes against humanity that Israel is committing” in the Palestinian territory by the unusual combined Islamic-Arab summit.
Israel claims the hospitals should be evacuated and that it is working to liberate the more than 200 captives that Hamas terrorists kidnapped on October 7.
The European Union called on Israel to exercise “maximum restraint” to protect civilians and denounced Hamas for using “hospitals and civilians as human shields” in Gaza.
In a statement released on behalf of the 27-nation group on Sunday, European Union foreign policy head Josep Borrell stated, “These hostilities are severely impacting hospitals and taking a horrific toll on civilians and medical staff.”
According to White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, Hamas is breaking the rules of war by housing militants and weaponry in hospitals and other non-military sites.
“The United States does not want to see firefights in hospitals where innocent people, patients receiving medical care, are caught in the crossfire, and we’ve had active consultations with the Israeli Defense Forces on this,” Sullivan stated to CBS News. Over a month ago, the Israeli government declared war on Hamas after terrorists carried out a massacre in southern Israel, murdering approximately 1,200 people, the majority of whom were civilians.
About 40% of the 11,078 Gazans who have perished in air and artillery attacks since then, according to Palestinian officials on Friday, were minors.
Numerous cities throughout the world have witnessed rallies by hundreds of thousands of people calling for a ceasefire in reaction to the Israeli military response, which has also incited indignation.
Supporters of Israel, especially some in Washington, claim that a truce would give Hamas time to organize new attacks. Still, the Biden administration has pressured Israel to let breaks in the combat allow for the evacuation of people and the entry of relief.
Biden agreed that all captives held by Hamas must be freed “without further delay” during a conversation regarding the latest events in Gaza on Sunday with Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the Emir of Qatar, according to a statement from the White House.
The fighting has heightened fears of a broader confrontation. Similar to Hamas, Hezbollah is situated in Lebanon and has reciprocated missile strikes with Israel. Additionally, other Iran-backed organizations in Iraq and Syria have launched at least forty drone and rocket attacks against American soldiers.
In what seemed to be the most recent reaction to the assaults, the United States launched two airstrikes in Syria on Sunday against organizations that were associated with Iran, a U.S. defense official told Reuters.
CHILDREN AT RISK
The Israeli military said that on Saturday night, it had offered to evacuate infants and had positioned 300 liters of gasoline outside al-Shifa’s gate; however, Hamas had prevented both actions.
Israel claimed to have supplied a certain amount of gasoline. Still, Hamas refuted this claim, stating that the Gaza Health Ministry ran the hospital and that the fuel was “not enough to operate the hospital’s generators for more than half an hour.”
According to Health Ministry spokesman Ashraf Al-Qidra, three of the 45 newborns kept in incubators at al-Shifa have already passed away. According to a cosmetic surgeon in al-Shifa, workers were obliged to arrange preterm newborns on regular beds when the incubator facility was bombed, utilizing the limited electricity to run the air conditioning to keep them warm.
“We anticipate losing an increasing number of them daily,” Dr. Ahmed El Mokhallalati stated.
Al-Quds, the second-biggest hospital in the strip, is reportedly out of commission, with staff members battling to provide little food, water, and medication to those already there, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent.
“Al Quds Hospital has been isolated from the outside world for the past six to seven days. “There is no entry and exit point,” stated Tommaso Della Longa, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies’ spokesman.
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