According to the Palestinian Red Crescent, more patients have been evacuated from the embattled Shifa Hospital in Gaza. 14 ambulances and two UN buses 190 injured and sick people, their companions and some medical staff were taken to hospitals in Khan Yunis and Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip, the aid organization said late on Wednesday evening. It remained unclear how many of the 190 were injured and sick. “Many other injured people and their companions, along with medical staff, are still in the hospital.”
The evacuation with the support of the United Nations (UN) took almost 20 hours, the Red Crescent said. The convoy was hindered and extensively searched at a checkpoint that separates the northern and southern Gaza Strip. The lives of the wounded and sick were endangered as a result. Most recently, 31 premature babies were evacuated from the Shifa Hospital and taken to the south of the sealed-off coastal strip.
Despite international criticism, Israeli soldiers are deployed in and around the clinic and are pushing for its evacuation. Israel accuses the Islamist Hamas of using the hospital for terrorist purposes and of operating a command center under the buildings and of having set up a network of tunnels and bunkers. Hamas denies this.