Gaza medics struggle to rescue patients after Israel orders hospital evacuated
World
Gaza medics struggle to rescue patients after Israel orders hospital evacuated
CAIRO (Reuters) - Israel ordered the closure and evacuation on Sunday of one of the last hospitals still partly functioning in a besieged area on the northern edge of the Gaza Strip, forcing medics to search for a way to bring hundreds of patients and staff to safety.
The head of the Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahiya, Husam Abu Safiya, told Reuters via text message that obeying the order to shut down was "next to impossible" because there were not enough ambulances to get patients out.
"We currently have nearly 400 civilians inside the hospital, including babies in the neonatal unit, whose lives depend on oxygen and incubators. We cannot evacuate these patients safely without assistance, equipment, and time," said Abu Safiya.
"We are sending this message under heavy bombardment and direct targeting of the fuel tanks, which if hit will cause a large explosion and mass casualties of the civilians inside," he said.
Photos from inside the hospital showed patients on beds crammed into corridors to keep them away from windows. Reuters could not immediately verify those images.
The hospital is one of the only ones still even partially functioning in the once crowded northern edge of the Gaza Strip, an area under Israeli siege for nearly three months in one of the most punishing operations of the 14-month-old war.
Abu Safiya said the military had ordered patients and staff to be evacuated to another hospital where conditions are even worse.
The army did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Israel says its siege of three communities on the northern edge of the Gaza Strip - Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanoun and Jabalia - is part of an operation to prevent militants from regrouping. Palestinians accuse Israel of seeking to permanently depopulate the area to create a buffer zone, which Israel denies.
