The aid organization accused Israel of “deliberately” launching the airstrikes “directly next to Al-Quds Hospital, with the aim of forcing the medical staff, displaced people, and patients to evacuate the hospital”.

Videos from the Palestinian Red Crescent show dust clouding up hallways in the hospital, with some people trying to put on face masks.

The director of Al-Quds Hospital, Dr. Bashar Mourad, told CNN the vicinity of the hospital had been targeted three times by Israeli airstrikes Sunday as of 4:45 p.m. local time (10:45 a.m. ET).

Al-Quds Hospital is treating hundreds of patients, including wounded people, patients in intensive care and children in incubators, the Palestinian Red Crescent noted. In addition, approximately 12,000 internally displaced civilians are currently sheltering at the hospital.

The hospital is located in the Tal Al Hawa neighborhood in Gaza City, north of Wadi Gaza — the line south of which Israel has urged people in Gaza to flee.

Earlier Sunday, the Palestinian Red Crescent had confirmed it received a warning to immediately evacuate the hospital. The World Health Organization has said the order is impossible without endangering the lives of patients.

Dr Subhi Sukeyk, the director of the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital in Gaza, has also reported “significant damage” to the medical facility following renewed and multiple Israeli bombings on nearby targets.

The hospital is the only medical centre in Gaza capable of handling cancer cases.
In recent weeks, it has already stopped some of its services due to Israel preventing fuel from being allowed into the territory.

There are an estimated 9,000 cancer patients in Gaza, which has a population of about 2.3 million.

Palestinians have blamed Israel for an explosion at al-Ahli Arab Hospital that killed nearly 500 people on October 17.

Figures released by the NGO on Sunday, referencing Palestinian health authorities, show that at least 3,324 children have been killed in Gaza since October 7, while 36 have died in the West Bank.

According to reports from the UN Secretary-General on children and armed conflict, a total of 2,985 children were killed across 24 countries in 2022, 2,515 in 2021, and 2,674 in 2020 across 22 countries, Save the Children said.

“One child’s death is one too many, but these are grave violations of epic proportions,” stated Jason Lee, Save the Children’s country director for the occupied Palestinian territory.

“A ceasefire is the only way to ensure their safety. The international community must put people before politics – every day spent debating is leaving children killed and injured. Children must be protected at all times, especially when they are seeking safety in schools and hospitals.”

The statement comes as Israel pushes forward with expanded ground operations inside Gaza as heavy aerial bombardment continues. On Friday, the entire Gaza Strip experienced a near-total communication blackout in what emerging accounts have described as a night of sheer terror and some of the heaviest fighting since the war began.

A further 1,000 children have been reported missing in Gaza and may be under the rubble. Children make up more than 40 percent of the more than 8,000 people confirmed to have been killed in Gaza. More than 6,000 children have been injured in Gaza since the war began.

Overall, at least 1,400 Israelis and foreign nationals have also been killed in Israel, mostly in the surprise attack by Hamas on October 7.

Israel has imposed a total siege on the Gaza Strip, tightening the blockade enforced since 2007, cutting all supplies of food, electricity, fuel and water, and only allowing small amounts of aid in through the Rafah crossing with Egypt since October 21.

The lack of electricity as well as the scarcity of fuel to power generators has forced hospitals to cut down on their operations and the health ministry declared Gaza’s health system in a state of “complete collapse”, further endangering the lives of children, including babies in need of energy-intensive neonatal intensive care.

On Sunday, the Israeli military stepped up attacks close to al-Quds Hospital in Gaza City, after ordering its “immediate” evacuation.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) on Sunday announced it has received “serious threats” from Israeli forces to “immediately evacuate” the al-Quds Hospital in the Tal al-Hawa area of Gaza City. Attacks in the vicinity of the hospital continued throughout the day.

The director of the hospital said there is no reason for Israel to be targeting the facility or the areas nearby.

“There’s no police presence in the hospital, no military presence, nothing at all. Just thousands of Palestinians here, many of whom have lost their homes. Thousands of others are seeking shelter in UNRWA schools,” he told Al Jazeera.

“Israel is targeting every single building around al-Quds Hospital. Why is that? Nobody knows.”

The PRCS has reported that the hospital is currently providing care to hundreds of injured patients. Around 12,000 displaced civilians, with a majority being children and women, have also sought refuge in the hospital building.

“We reiterate – it’s impossible to evacuate hospitals full of patients without endangering their lives,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director of the World Health Organization (WHO), wrote on X.

Palestinians have blamed Israel for an explosion at al-Ahli Arab Hospital that killed nearly 500 people on October 17. Israel has denied being responsible.

“Impeding relief supplies as provided by the Geneva conventions may constitute a crime within the court jurisdiction,” Khan told reporters in Cairo on Sunday.

He added he wanted “to underline clearly to Israel that there must be discernible efforts without further delay to make sure civilians” in the Hamas-run Palestinian territory “receive basic food, medicines”.

“I saw trucks full of goods full of humanitarian assistance stuck where nobody needs them, stuck in Egypt, stuck at Rafah,” Khan continued.

“These supplies must get to the civilians of Gaza without delay.”

On Sunday, the United Nations warned it feared a breakdown of public order after looting at food aid centres in Gaza run by its agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

UN chief Antonio Guterres said the situation was “growing more desperate by the hour” as casualties in the war increase and essential supplies of food, water, medicine and shelter dwindle.

People in the Palestinian territory have lived under Israeli blockade for 17 years and under complete siege for the past three weeks.

The health ministry in Gaza announced that Israeli bombardment has killed more than 8,000 people, mainly civilians and half of them children.

Khan stated his office had an ongoing investigation into “any crimes committed on the territory of Palestine and any crimes committed, whether it’s by Israel and Palestine or whether it’s acts committed on the territory of Palestine or from Palestine into Israel”.

“This includes current events in Gaza and also current events in the West Bank,” Khan said, adding that he was “very concerned also by the spike of the number of reported incidents of attack by settlers against Palestinian civilians” in the territory Israel has occupied since 1967.

Khan also noted hostage taking was a breach of the Geneva Conventions.

“I call for the immediate release of all hostages taken from Israel and for their safe return to their families,” Khan said.

The British lawyer added “Israel has clear obligations in relation to its war with Hamas, not just moral obligations but legal obligations” to comply with the laws of conflict.

“These principles equally apply to Hamas in relation to firing indiscriminate rockets into Israel,” he continued.

Abu Ubaida, spokesman for the Gaza-based movement’s military wing, al-Qassam Brigades, issued the warning after Netanyahu announced what he claimed to be the “second stage” of a ground incursion by the Israeli army into Gaza.

“We are still waiting for him,” Abu Ubaida said in a video statement on Sunday.

“We will make him taste, by the strength of God, a defeat greater than what he expects or fears,” he added.

The al-Qassam spokesman also hit out at Arab countries for a lack of humanitarian assistance to the besieged Gaza Strip and stated the occupying regime was to blame for the failure to achieve an agreement over a prisoner swap with Palestinians.

“To the leaders of our Arab nations…We do not ask you to mobilize your armies and tanks, God forbid, to defend the children of Arabs and Islam in Gaza,” Abu Ubaida continued, adding “But have you reached the point where you cannot send relief and humanitarian aid?”

The spokesman stressed that there were “numerous contacts regarding the prisoner issue,” and a chance to strike a deal; however, Israel was not willing to agree to the terms of the agreement, which focused on the release of 200 Israeli captives being held by the brigades, as well the rest who were kept by other Palestinian resistance factions.

The al-Qassam Brigades previously announced that around 50 of the captives had been killed in the Israeli war on Gaza.

Israel has been waging a barbaric war against Gaza since October 7, when Hamas-led Palestinian resistance groups launched their biggest operation against Israel in years. The sneak attack, dubbed Operation Al-Aqsa Storm, came in response to the regime’s intensified crimes against the Palestinian people.

The Israeli war has so far claimed the lives of over 8,000 innocent Palestinians, including more than 3,500 children, and left upwards of 20,500 others wounded.

The United Nations General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a resolution on Friday, calling for the implementation of an immediate “humanitarian truce” in Gaza.

The vote at the General Assembly came after the United Nations Security Council failed four times in the past two weeks to take action due to the US’s recurrently casting its veto against relevant resolutions.

The assembly stressed the “importance of preventing further destabilization and escalation of violence in the region,” calling on “all parties to exercise maximum restraint and upon all those with influence on them to work toward this objective.”

Israel has rejected all calls for a ceasefire, claiming it would benefit Hamas.

According to the paper, the initial plans “alarmed” officials in Washington, who voiced concern that they “lacked achievable military objectives”, with fears that the IDF was not yet prepared for a full-scale ground assault.

However, an unnamed US government source told the daily that after discussions with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and other officials “the Israelis improved and refined their plan” for the offensive.
As a result, the report added, the IDF’s actions in Gaza have so far been “smaller and more narrowly focused” than Israeli officials initially proposed to their US counterparts.

Numerous US officials and former commanders told the outlet that “Israel appeared to be conducting a phased operation” with reconnaissance units probing Hamas positions in Gaza for potential weaknesses.

According to the article, however, Israel’s decision-making process was also influenced by deliberations concerning hostages held by Hamas, as well as by a rift in the leadership over how, when, and even whether to kick off the operation.

Commenting on the progress of the battle, IDF spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari has stated that the Israeli military had “expanded the entry” into the Palestinian enclave overnight.

“We are progressing through the stages of the war according to plan,” he said, adding that the IDF is “gradually expanding the ground activity and the scope of our forces” in the area.

Earlier this month, several media outlets reported the US was exerting strong influence on Israel’s plans, with Bloomberg describing it as “deeper and more intense than any exerted by Washington in the past”. Several outlets reported the US also wanted the IDF to delay its incursion to gain more time to secure the release of more than 200 hostages held by Hamas.

US President Joe Biden, however, rejected the notion that Washington was pressuring Israel to postpone the ground campaign, saying that “the Israelis can make their own decisions”.

So far, the hostilities have claimed the lives of more than 8,000 Palestinians and 1,400 Israelis. After Israel announced the “complete siege” of Gaza, the UN warned that the humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian enclave had reached an “unprecedented point.”