Fighting continued undiminished between the Israeli army and Hamas in the north of the Gaza Strip on Sunday, November 12. Caught in the crossfire, Gaza City’s hospitals are no longer able to carry out their functions.
Israeli troops waged fierce battles against Hamas on Sunday near Gaza’s biggest hospital, where thousands were trapped and officials said a lack of fuel caused the deaths of premature babies and critical patients.
Al-Shifa Hospital Under Siege
In Gaza City, Al-Shifa hospital is caught in Israel’s ground offensive aimed at destroying Hamas, and the compound has been repeatedly hit by strikes, one of which Gaza health officials said destroyed the cardiac ward on Sunday.
The Israeli military has denied deliberately targeting hospitals and has accused the Islamist militant group of using medical facilities or tunnels underneath them as hideouts — a charge Hamas denies.
Fears intensified for Palestinians seeking shelter and patients needing treatment after Gaza City’s Al-Quds hospital went out of service due to a lack of generator fuel, the Palestinian Red Crescent said.
Despite growing calls for a ceasefire, Netanyahu has flatly rejected halting the fighting without the release of the hostages.
Hospitals in ‘Dire’ State
Witnesses at Al-Shifa hospital told AFP by phone on Sunday that “violent fighting” had raged around the hospital the whole night.
Inside, doctors said Saturday that two babies had died in the neonatal unit after power to their incubators was cut off, and a man had also died when his ventilator shut down.
A “safe passage” was to be opened from Al-Shifa to allow people to flee toward the south, the Israeli military said Sunday.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said the situation inside Al-Shifa was “dire and perilous” and it was “not functioning as a hospital anymore.”
Twenty of Gaza’s 36 hospitals are “no longer functioning,” according to the UN’s humanitarian agency.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell condemned Hamas for using “hospitals and civilians as human shields” in Gaza, while also urging Israel to show “maximum restraint.”
Low Amount of Aid
Very little aid has made it into Gaza during the war, with the densely populated coastal territory effectively sealed off by a total blockade that Israel has vowed to maintain until the hostages are freed.
Only a handful of trucks carrying fuel had been let into Gaza since October 7, with Israel concerned fuel deliveries would be used by Hamas militants.
Perched on trucks, crammed in cars, pulled by donkeys on carts and on foot, many thousands of Palestinians have fled Israeli army strikes on the territory squeezed between Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean.
Airstrikes Across the Strip
Almost 1.6 million people — about two-thirds of Gaza’s population — have been internally displaced since October 7, according to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA.
Strikes were also hitting buildings at the southern end of Gaza in Rafah, the area to which civilians have been urged to evacuate.
A strike in southern Bani Suheila destroyed a dozen houses on Sunday, killing at least four people and wounding at least 30, said an AFP reporter at the scene.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) urged in a statement “the protection of civilians in Gaza trapped in fighting.”
Malo Pinatel, with AFP
