Following a siege for several days, Israeli forces have raided Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza said on Tuesday.
The director of the hospital, Ahmed Al-Kahlot, said on Monday that the Israeli military directly bombed the maternity ward, resulting in the deaths of two women and their two children, and the amputation of a third woman’s feet, the Palestinian media outlet Wafa reported.
The situation in Kamal Adwan Hospital is catastrophic, Doctors Without Borders (or MSF) has said.
The hospital remains surrounded by Israeli troops and tanks, and fighting with armed groups has been reported in its vicinity for three consecutive days.
“We call on the United Nations, the World Health Organisation and the International Committee of the Red Cross to act immediately to save the lives of those in the hospital,” Ashraf al-Qudra said in a statement on Tuesday.
The hospital is currently accommodating 65 patients, including 12 children in the intensive care unit (ICU) and six newborns in incubators. About 3,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) remain trapped in the facility and are awaiting evacuation with extreme shortages of water, food and power reported.
The hospital is situated near the Jabalia neighbourhood, which has been the scene of intense fighting in recent days.
On 12 December, the World Health Organization (WHO) executive board unanimously adopted a resolution addressing the dire humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, which emphasized health as a universal priority and called for immediate, unimpeded aid deliveries.
The WHO Director-General reported that “Gaza’s health system is on its knees and collapsing, with the risk expected to worsen with the deteriorating situation and approaching winter conditions.”
Between the afternoons of 10 and 11 December, 208 Palestinians were killed and another 416 were injured, according to the Ministry of Health (MoH) in Gaza.
