Israeli tanks shelled the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza, on Thursday as patients are dying inside due to shortages caused by a 20-day Israeli siege.
According to Al Jazeera, the hospital’s director, Dr. Hussam Abu Safia, said the Israeli shelling caused “severe damage” to the Intensive Care Unit. Hours before the shelling, he warned the hospital would turn into a “mass grave” and that one patient was dying every hour because of the Israeli siege.
“There is a very large number of wounded people, and we lose at least one person every hour because of the lack of medical supplies and medical staff. Our ambulances can’t transfer wounded people. Those who can arrive by themselves to the hospital receive care. But those who don’t just die in the streets,” Abu Safia said.
Also on Thursday, the Palestinian Civil Defense agency said its rescuers were forced to suspend operations in northern Gaza. “Our work has completely stopped in the northern governorate and the situation has become catastrophic there, and the citizens there are now without humanitarian services,” the agency said.
Footage from the Kamal Adwan Hospital shows staff caring for a newborn baby in the neonatal unit. Abu Safia also told The Associated Press that “some medical staff members have been either killed, arrested, or injured.”
Dr. Mohammed Obeid, an orthopedic surgeon for Doctors Without Borders who is at Kamal Adwan, said on Wednesday that there were 30 people dead inside the hospital and around 130 injured patients.
“There is death in all types and forms in Kamal Adwan Hospital and north Gaza. The bombardment does not stop. The artillery does not stop. The planes do not stop. There is heavy shelling, and the hospital is targeted, too. It just looks like a movie; it does not seem real,” Obeid said.
Kamal Adwan is one of three hospitals in northern Gaza that is still somewhat functioning, and it’s the only one with a specialized neonatal unit for newborns. The Israeli military ordered the evacuation of all three hospitals at the beginning of the month as it started an ethnic cleansing campaign in the north, but the staff refused to abandon their patients.
Israel usually justifies its attacks on Gaza hospitals by claiming Hamas members are present but never offers evidence for its claims. Ninety-nine American healthcare workers who volunteered in Gaza recently said in an open letter to President Biden that none of them ever saw militant activity where they worked.
“The 99 signatories to this letter spent a combined 254 weeks inside Gaza’s largest hospitals and clinics. We wish to be absolutely clear: not once did any of us see any type of Palestinian militant activity in any of Gaza’s hospitals or other healthcare facilities,” the healthcare workers said.
