Gazans describe bodies crushed in raid on hospital
Palestinians who fled an ongoing Israeli raid in and around Gaza’s main hospital described days of heavy fighting, mass arrests and forced marches past dead bodies in interviews yesterday. Israel’s military says it has killed over 170 militants and detained about 480 suspects in the raid on Al Shifa Hospital that began on Monday, calling it a heavy blow to Hamas and other armed groups it says had regrouped in the compound.
The fighting also highlights the resilience of Palestinian armed groups in a heavily destroyed part of Gaza where Israeli troops have been forced to return after a similar raid in the earliest weeks of the war.
Kareem Ayman Hathat, who lived in a five-story building about 100 metres from the hospital, said he huddled in the kitchen for days while gunfire and explosions sometimes caused the building to shake.
Early Saturday, Israeli troops stormed the building and forced dozens of residents to leave. He said men were forced to strip to their underwear and four were detained. The rest were blindfolded and ordered to follow a tank south as blasts thundered around them. “From time to time, the tank would fire a shell,” he told The Associated Press from another hospital where he has sought shelter. “It was to terrorize us.” Israeli jets on Sunday launched several strikes near the hospital.
Jameel Al Ayoubi, among thousands of people sheltering at Shifa when the current raid began, said in a phone interview that tanks and armoured bulldozers had plowed into the hospital courtyard, crushing ambulances and civilian vehicles. He saw tanks driving over at least four bodies of people killed early in the raid.
Israel’s military said on Saturday it had evacuated patients and medical staff from Shifa’s emergency department because militants “entrenched” themselves in the building.