Officials: Patients dead in hospital raid
Israel claims facility used for military purposes
While the Israeli military continued its raid on the largest functioning hospital in southern Gaza, at least four patients died after a power outage left them without oxygen, Gaza health officials said Friday.
Troops stormed Nasser Hospital on Thursday after a dayslong siege of the facility in which patients, doctors and humanitarian aid groups described an increasingly dire situation with dwindling supplies, including food and water, as well as reports of snipers shooting civilians trying to leave the area.
The Israeli military says Hamas has used the hospital for military purposes, including to hide some of the 250 hostages who were taken captive on Oct. 7.
On Friday, the Israel Defense Forces said it discovered mortar shells, grenades and weapons in the facility and arrested more than 20 militants who had participated in the Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel, which killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and triggered the war in Gaza. The claims could not be independently verified.
The U.N. Human Rights Office said the raid on Nasser Hospital appears to be “part of a pattern of attacks by Israeli forces striking essential life-saving civilian infrastructure in Gaza, especially hospitals.” The agency said it had documented similar raids in central and northern Gaza since the war began.
“With ... a nearly collapsed health system due to attacks on facilities and restrictions on essential humanitarian supplies, the impact on civilians is appalling,” read a statement from U.N. human rights spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani.
The Palestinian Red Crescent, an independent aid group, said the Israeli military has targeted the second floor of Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis as well, resulting in severe damage in two nursing rooms. Less than a week before the raid on Nasser Hospital, Israeli also launched a ground operation on AlAmal Hospital.
In other developments Friday, the White House announced a directive signed by President Joe Biden that will effectively allow Palestinian immigrants who would otherwise have to leave the United States to stay without the threat of deportation for at least 18 months.
Egypt building border wall
Egypt is clearing land and building a wall near its border with the Gaza Strip ahead of a planned and drawn-out Israeli military operation in Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza where more than a million people are sheltering from the war, according to satellite images reviewed by The Associated Press.
The construction signals Egypt’s preparation for a scenario in which some of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians crowded against the territory’s southern border may flee into Egypt. The Middle East neighbor has warned Israel that if this occurs, it would suspend the peace treaty it signed in the late 1970s.
The satellite images, taken Thursday by Maxar Technologies, show ongoing construction on the wall, which sits 2 miles west of the border with Gaza. Nearby, construction crews also appear to be leveling and clearing ground for an unknown purpose.
The Wall Street Journal, quoting anonymous Egyptian officials, described “an 8-square-mile walled enclosure” being built in the area that could accommodate over 100,000 people.
Netanyahu: No Palestinian state
After a phone call with Biden, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went on social media to say he rejects international pressure for the creation of a Palestinian state.
“Israel will continue to oppose the unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state,” Netanyahu said on Thursday. “Such recognition in the wake of the Oct. 7 massacre would give a huge reward to unprecedented terrorism and prevent any future peace settlement.”
Netanyahu has repeatedly opposed the creation of a Palestinian state. Over the phone, Biden and Netanyahu discussed “ongoing hostage negotiations,” the urgent need of humanitarian aid for Palestinian civilians and the Biden administration’s view that a military operation in Rafah “should not proceed without a credible and executable plan for ensuring the safety of and support for the civilians,” according to a White House summary.
Peace talks appeared to stall as Israel pulled out of ongoing discussions in Cairo this week, calling Hamas’ demands “delusional” and saying it had not been provided with any recent proposal.
Meanwhile, concerns are mounting over the planned offensive in Rafah, which Israel maintains is Hamas’ last stronghold.
Since Israel began its bombing campaign and ground invasion of Gaza, hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians have fled south, heeding evacuation orders and pamphlets from the Israeli military. Rafah’s prewar population of roughly 280,000 swelled to 1.4 million in a span of months as people crammed into overflowing shelters and sprawling tent encampments to avoid the escalating combat.
With the threat of a large-scale military operation, many civilians who have been displaced multiple times have begun to flee to other parts of the war-ravaged territory.