Israeli forces have stormed into Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahiya in north Gaza, expelled some staff and displaced people before withdrawing, and bodies of people killed by airstrikes littered the streets outside, its director has said.
The attack had begun with a series of airstrikes on the western and northern sides of Kamal Adwan accompanied by intensive shooting, the hospital director, Hussam Abu Safiyeh, said, speaking via an online chatroom, Reuters reported.
He said troops who swept into the hospital ordered all staff, patients and displaced people into its courtyard before allowing them hours later to return inside, though some staff, including its Indonesian emergency surgery team, and some displaced were ordered to leave the premises for good.
Gaza’s civil defence agency said 29 people were killed and dozens wounded on Friday by Israeli shelling in north Gaza, “especially around Kamal Adwan”. AFP reported that four hospital staff members were among the dead, citing Abu Safiyeh. The broadcaster Al Jazeera said it had verified footage of Israeli forces firing on a Palestine Red Crescent Society ambulance outside the hospital.
It is not possible to independently verify the reports as Israel does not allow foreign journalists into Gaza.
The Israeli military on Friday denied claims it had struck or entered Kamal Adwan hospital, saying it was operating next to the facility. “Contrary to the reports made over the past day, the [military] did not strike the Kamal Adwan hospital or operate within it,” it said in a statement.
This week Amnesty International released a report stating that Israel’s campaign in Gaza amounted to genocide. One of its main allegations was that Israel is inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about physical destruction, such as destroying medical infrastructure. Israel rejected the report.
Kamal Adwan hospital has been caught in renewed Israeli military operations in north Gaza against regrouping militants.
“This morning, we were shocked to see hundreds of bodies and wounded individuals in the streets surrounding the hospital,” Abu Safiyeh said in another statement posted online.
“The situation inside the hospital and in its vicinity is catastrophic. There are a large number of [dead] martyrs and wounded individuals, and no surgeons are left,” he said. Abu Safiyeh’s 15-year-old son was killed in an Israeli drone attack on the hospital in October, and his father was forced to bury him in the hospital yard.
Gaza’s health ministry said the three main hospitals on the northern end of the territory are barely functioning and have been under repeated attack since Israel sent tanks into Beit Lahiya and nearby Beit Hanoun and Jabalia in October.
Later on Friday, an Israeli airstrike on a house in Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip killed at least 18 people, including three children and two women, and wounded 30 other people, medics said.
They added that Israeli military strikes across the territory killed at least 53 Palestinians, most of them in northern Gaza on Friday.
In a distress call on Friday, the ministry accused the Israeli military of committing a “war crime” in Kamal Adwan hospital by perpetrating “all forms of killing and violence inside and around it”.
It added: “The injured who remained inside are in critical condition and need immediate medical care.”
The ministry said only half of the 37 hospitals and clinics in the war-devastated territory remained operational but lacked essential equipment, manpower, and medical and fuel supplies.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday Israeli forces had bombed Kamal Adwan hospital early on Thursday apparently without warning its staff in advance. It came just days after the WHO said an emergency medical team had reached the hospital for the first time in 60 days.
Dr Faradina Sulistiyani, a surgeon on the team, told AFP from Gaza City that all seven of her team members left the premises on foot as the bombing went on.
“That is extremely concerning and should never happen,” WHO spokesperson Rik Peeperkorn told a Geneva briefing by video link. The hospital is now “minimally functional”, he added.
Israel’s military says it has killed hundreds of militants in fighting with Hamas in north Gaza since October, a heavily urbanised area it claimed to have subdued early this year.
On Friday, it said that over the past week its forces had killed several senior Hamas operatives who were involved in the 7 October 2023 cross-border attack that precipitated the war, and were commanding militant units in north and central Gaza.
Hamas and its smaller ally Islamic Jihad say they have killed many Israeli soldiers in those areas in the same period.
Residents of Beit Lahiya said the army blew up several houses overnight not far from Kamal Adwan hospital. Palestinians say Israel plans to carve out a buffer zone along the northern fringes of Gaza after depopulating the area. Israel denies this.
Israel launched its air and ground assault on densely populated, Hamas-ruled Gaza after militants stormed Israeli border communities 14 months ago, killing 1,200 people and capturing over 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Since then, nearly the entire 2.3 million population has been displaced. Gaza’s health ministry says more than 44,500 residents have been killed, with thousands more feared dead under the rubble.
Reuters and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report
