Al Ahly Arab Hospital, one of the last still operating in the northern Gaza Strip, ceased operations today after it came under attack by the Israeli army, its director said.
The Israeli army has besieged a hospital in Gaza City since Monday evening, arresting several doctors, nurses, wounded people and destroying part of the premises, its director, doctor Fadel Naim, told AFP. “The invasion of the occupying army has put the hospital out of action, we cannot accept patients and wounded”– he said.
Four people wounded by Israeli fire on Monday while in hospital died today, he added. “They blindfolded us and tied us up. Our hands hurt from the ropes. We were tied up for more than nine hours in the cold,” – said nurse Mohammad Araj in an interview with AFPTV, the French Agency’s television channel, after his release.
“They tortured everyone they wanted. We heard screams as they blindfolded us. We didn’t know what would happen to us, whether they would kill us or whether we would survive.” – he added. When asked about this, the Israeli army did not immediately respond to these allegations. Al-Ahly Arab Hospital, also called Baptist, was already damaged after an explosion in its parking lot on October 17, which killed more than 400 people, according to Hamas authorities. Hamas blamed the explosion on the Israeli strike, which rejected the accusation, saying it had “proof” that it was a cell “Islamic Jihad”another Palestinian armed group.
Hamas government health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Kidreh said today that another hospital in the northern Gaza Strip, Al-Awda, located in Jabaliya, has been converted by the Israeli army into “barracks”. According to him, the army detained 240 people in the hospital, “including 80 nursing staff and 40 patients”and arrested its director, doctor Ahmad Mhana.
The humanitarian situation, already catastrophic, continues to deteriorate in the Gaza Strip due to intense Israeli bombing, according to humanitarian organizations working in the area. Water, electricity and food shortages remain severe despite the arrival of humanitarian aid.
On Sunday, the World Health Organization announced that the hospital “Al-Ahly Arafat” accepts “seriously ill patients” from a nearby hospital “Al-Sifa” “for performing surgical operations”. Al-Sifah, the largest hospital complex in the Gaza Strip, is now running on a bare-bones basis, with a very limited team of doctors and nurses, following a major operation in November against the Israeli army, which accuses Hamas of using the hospitals as command centers.
According to the UN, less than a third of hospitals in Gaza are functioning, and only partially. The hospitals have been the target of repeated Israeli strikes since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas, which broke out after the Palestinian movement carried out an unprecedented attack on Israeli territory on October 7.
A total of 1,140 people, mostly civilians, were killed that day, according to a French agency tally based on the latest official Israeli data. In retaliation, Israel, which has vowed to destroy the Islamist movement, has been bombing the Gaza Strip since October 7, where nearly 19,670 people, mostly civilians, have been killed, according to the Hamas government.
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