Israel storms Gaza hospital used as ‘Hamas terror hub’
Military carries out ‘precise and limited’ raid as doctors in Gaza condemn ‘very dangerous’ operation
‘Since the midnight hours, violent shelling and severe explosions have continued in the vicinity’
ISRAELI forces stormed one of the few functioning hospitals in southern Gaza yesterday, claiming Hamas was hiding the bodies of dead hostages there.
Verified footage on social media showed medical workers at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis rushing a patient on a bed through the smoke-filled corridors of a facility that appeared to have been heavily damaged by shelling. Another video showed a patient being carried away in a blanket, while shots could be heard in the background.
The Israeli military defended the raid as “precise and limited”. It insisted it had “credible evidence” from several sources, including released hostages, that Hamas had held captives in the hospital and may be keeping the remains of murdered Israelis there.
The group “systematically uses hospitals as terror hubs”, said Daniel Hagari, an IDF spokesman, yesterday, alleging that 85 per cent of all the medical facilities in the sealed-off territory “have been used for terror operations”.
Later yesterday evening, Mr Hagari added that the army “have not yet found any evidence” of hostages’ bodies, but that forces had found “weapons, grenades and mortar bombs” in the hospital complex.
The military had ordered the evacuation of the hospital last month. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said doctors and patients were free to stay and would not be forcibly evacuated. But thousands of displaced people with nowhere else to go, as well as doctors and patients unable to move, remained in the compound.
The army was searching several of the facility’s buildings, said Shaban Tabash, a nurse at the hospital. Doctors were unable to provide treatment to the patients in the building, which was not properly equipped, he added. “The situation of patients is difficult,” he told the Associated Press (AP).
The hospital came under sustained Israeli shelling in the early hours of yesterday morning. A hospital ward was hit, killing one patient and wounding six others, all of whom were being treated for previous wounds, Dr Khaled Alserr, one of the few remaining surgeons at the facility, told AP.
“Since the midnight hours, violent shelling and severe explosions have continued in the vicinity of the complex,” Nahed Abu-teima, Nasser Hospit al ’s dire ctor, t old BBC Arabic. Conditions were “catastrophic and very dangerous”, he said, adding that the only patients remaining in the hospital “cannot move or cannot walk”.
By yesterday afternoon, Israeli troops had reportedly “stormed” the maternity ward, destroyed Nasser’s ambulance station and bulldozed i mprovised graves on the hospital grounds, according to the health ministry.
Israel has had the hospital in its crosshairs since a freed hostage said in an interview last month that most of her time in captivity in Gaza was spent there. Sharon Cunio, who was released in a deal with Hamas in November, told AP she was moved to the hospital in an ambulance.
Israel says Hamas uses the hospital for military activities. International law prohibits the targeting of medical facilities, but they can lose those protections if they are used for military purposes.
Separately, Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister, spoke to Benjamin Netanyahu to urge him to open Kerem Shalom so that aid could reach Gaza.
“The Prime Minister highlighted the scale of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” Downing Street said.