Patients, babies, and medics left stranded
Deir al-Balah (Gaza Strip), Nov 13: Battles around hospitals have forced thousands of Palestinians to flee from some of the last shelters in northern Gaza while stranding critically wounded patients, including newborns, and their caregivers with dwindling supplies and no electricity, health officials said on Monday.
The Israeli military has urged Palestinians to flee south on foot through what it calls safe corridors. But its purported drive to separate civilians from Hamas militants has come at a heavy cost, with more than two thirds of the territory’s population of 2.3 million having already fled their homes.
As Israeli troops encircled Gaza’s Shifa Hospital over the weekend, thousands fled, while hundreds of patients and displaced people remained, according to officials. World Health Organisation Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Shifa “is not functioning as a hospital anymore”.
Another hospital in Gaza City, Al-Quds, was forced to shut down on Sunday because it ran out of fuel.
The Palestinian Red Crescent, which operates the facility, said Israeli forces are stationed nearby and that preparations are being made to evacuate some 6,000 patients, medics and displaced people.
Both sides have seized on the plight of hospitals, particularly Shifa’s, as a symbol of the larger war, now in its sixth week.
For Palestinians, Shifa evokes the suffering of civilians.
Thousands of people displaced by airstrikes that have destroyed entire city blocks have sought shelter in its darkened corridors.
Doctors running low on supplies perform surgery there on war-wounded patients, including children, without anesthesia. One medic shared a photo showing nine premature babies in a shared crib.
Israel says Hamas shields itself among civilians and the hospital, Gaza’s largest, is a prime example of that, claiming that the militants have a command centre in and beneath the medical compound.
Israel has not provided photos or videos to back up the Shifa claims, though it has shared footage of militants operating in residential neighbourhoods and positioning rockets and weapons near schools and mosques.
Both Hamas and the hospital staff at Shifa deny the Israeli allegations.
A UN health official said many displaced families and patients with moderate injuries fled the hospital over the weekend. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to brief reporters, said most of the remaining patients could only be relocated with ambulances and other special procedures.
Mohammed Zaqout, the director of hospitals in Gaza, said those who remain include about 650 patients, 500 medical staff and around 2,500 displaced Palestinians sheltering inside hospital buildings. That’s down from more than 20,000 people reported to be at the hospital on Saturday by the Health Ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza.
The ministry said 32 patients, including three babies, have died since the hospital’s emergency generator ran out of fuel on Saturday. It said 36 babies, as well as other patients, are at risk of dying because there is no way to power life-saving medical equipment.
Medical Aid for Palestinians, a UK-based charity that has supported Shifa’s neonatal intensive care unit, said transferring critically ill infants is complex.
The military said it placed 300 litres of fuel near the hospital, but that Hamas militants had prevented staff from reaching it.
The Health Ministry disputed that and said the fuel would have provided less than an hour of electricity. (AP)