Patients, staff trapped in Gaza’s hospital amid Israeli siege

Israeli soldiers raided the hospital in northern Gaza on Friday and ordered patients to move down to the main courtyard, the Wafa news agency reported, as they conducted mass arrests.

At least two children have died in the intensive care unit after the hospital’s generators stopped and the oxygen station was targeted, the health ministry announced in a statement.

Among those inside are 195 patients, and 70 medical staff members, the ministry said in its statement, adding that the situation there is “alarmingly deteriorating”.

The raid came a day after Israeli tanks shelled the compound of the hospital, one of the few remaining functioning medical facilities in the north of the enclave, as the Israeli siege entered its third week.

According to the hospital’s director, Hussam Abu Safia, the intensive care unit suffered severe damage from the tank attack.

He warned that the hospital could become a mass grave as one patient was dying every hour as a result of the Israeli military assault.

World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Ghebreyesus said “we have lost touch with the personnel” at the hospital and called the raid “deeply disturbing”.

He wrote in a post on social media platform X, that the hospital “has been overflowing with close to 200 patients – a constant stream of horrific trauma cases. It is also full of hundreds of people seeking shelter”.

The Palestinian Health Ministry noted Israeli soldiers “stormed” the hospital, “detaining hundreds of patients, medical staff and some displaced individuals from neighbouring areas who sought refuge”.

Witnesses and doctors at the scene say fires had broken out, making it difficult for people to evacuate the building and for ambulances to operate. Wounded patients and those with other health complications were dragged outside the buildings into the courtyard of the hospital.

A second medical facility in northern Gaza, the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahiya, was put out of service on Monday as Israeli soldiers stormed a school and detained the men there before setting the facility ablaze. The fire reached the hospital generators, causing a power outage.

Those evacuated from the Indonesian Hospital were displaced to Kamal Adwan Hospital, a mid-size facility struggling to accommodate patients beyond capacity.

The United Nations announced it had been unable to reach all three hospitals in northern Gaza – Kamal Adwan, Indonesian and al-Awda Hospital – despite demanding access to allow aid in.

The UN Human Rights Office stressed it was “increasingly concerned that the manner in which the Israeli military is conducting hostilities” in northern Gaza, also with the “unlawful interference with humanitarian assistance and orders that are leading to forced displacement”.