Israel presses raid at Gaza hospital
Israel renewed its military operation Thursday at Gaza’s largest hospital, targeting what it said was a Hamas command center hidden beneath thousands of patients, medics, and displaced people.
“Tonight, we conducted a targeted operation into Shifa hospital,” said Major Gen. Yaron Finkelman, the head of army operations in Gaza. “We continue to move forward.”
Both Israel and its top ally the United States said Hamas has built in tunnels below the Al-shifa complex, which has become a focal point in the war.
The Palestinian militant group and directors at the hospital have denied the charge.
Gaza’s Hamas-controlled health ministry said Thursday that Israeli armored bulldozers had “destroyed parts of the southern entrance” of the hospital.
Before Israel first sent troops into the hospital complex on Wednesday, United Nations agencies estimated that 2,300 patients, staff, and displaced civilians were sheltering at Al-shifa.
Israel has vowed to eradicate Hamas in retaliation for the attacks of October 7, which killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians.
Hamas also took around 240 people hostage, among them elderly people and young children.
But with the Hamas-run health ministry saying the death toll from the offensive has now topped 11,500, including thousands of children, calls for a truce are mounting.
The United Nations Security Council on Wednesday set aside deep divisions over the conflict to agree a resolution calling for “urgent and extended humanitarian pauses” in fighting.
The resolution – which passed thanks to abstentions from the United States, Britain, and Russia – called on Hamas and Israel to protect civilians, “especially children.”
Israel has agreed to temporary localized pauses in fighting, but has rejected calls for a broader ceasefire.
“The @UN Security Council’s resolution is disconnected from reality and is meaningless,” Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
He also reiterated the Israeli government’s war aims, saying: “Israel will continue to act until Hamas is destroyed and the hostages are returned.”
The Israeli foreign ministry called Thursday on the Security Council and the international community to “stand firm on the prompt release” of all the kidnapped. “Extended humanitarian pauses are untenable as long as 239 abductees remain in the hands of Hamas terrorists,” it said.
Israel’s army claimed an initial raid in Al-shifa had uncovered military equipment, weapons, and what spokesman Daniel Hagari described as “an operational headquarters with comms equipment.”
A video narrated by another Israeli army spokesman showed rifles, ammunition, and ammo magazines inside an area he identified as Al-shifa’s
MRI scanner building. “This was hidden very conveniently, secretly behind the MRI machine,” said spokesman Jonathan Conricus.
The health ministry in Hamasrun Gaza said Wednesday the Israeli military did not find any weapons when it raided the hospital.
Witnesses have described conditions inside the hospital as horrific, with medical procedures performed without anaesthetic, families with scant food or water living in corridors, and the stench of decomposing corpses filling the air.
“The protection of newborns, patients, medical staff, and all civilians must override all other concerns,” UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths said. “Hospitals are not battlegrounds.”