The Israeli army is convinced of this. The most important hospital in the Gaza Strip, al-Chifa, serves as a strategic base for Hamas fighters. Israel therefore ordered its evacuation to carry out a military operation, even though thousands of people still crowded within its walls. “The Israeli Defense Forces are carrying out a targeted and precision operation against Hamas in a specific area of al-Shifa Hospital,” the army said early Wednesday in an English-language statement.
The Israeli army has on site “medical teams and Arabic-speaking people who have been trained specifically for this sensitive and complex environment, with the aim of ensuring that no harm is caused to civilians used by Hamas as human shields” , she added without specifying her targets.
“Tanks in the hospital”
“I am in the hospital and I see dozens of soldiers and commandos in the emergency room and at the reception and there are tanks that have entered the hospital complex,” Youssef Abul Reesh told AFP , a senior official in the Hamas government’s Ministry of Health, calling on the UN and the international community to intervene “immediately” to put an end to this operation.
Several thousand people, sick, staff and civilians displaced by the war, crowded onto the site of the al-Chifa hospital, which was surrounded by the Israeli army. The hospital director said at least “179 bodies” were buried in a mass grave on Tuesday. “There are bodies littering the aisles of the hospital complex and the refrigerated rooms of the morgues are no longer supplied” with electricity, Mohammed Abou Salmiya told AFP, before the Israeli operation in this hospital in central Gaza. city.
For Israel, this operation in a hospital does not violate international law. “We have repeatedly indicated that the continued use of al-Chifa hospital for military purposes by Hamas will lead to the end of its protection under international law,” the Hamas spokesperson said. Israeli army Daniel Hagari shortly before the operation.