Israeli soldiers stormed Gaza’s last functioning hospital on Friday and forced semi-naked Palestinian medics and patients to leave on foot to an unknown destination, according to videos and eyewitness testimony shared with Middle East Eye.
According to one video sent to MEE, several Israeli tanks could be seen stationed outside the bombed-out Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia, whilst dozens of men stripped to their underwear were being directed to an area off screen.
Islam Ahmad, a local journalist and eyewitness to the attack, said communication had been cut off with hospital staff hours before Israeli forces stormed the facility.
He told MEE that Israeli forces had been attacking the hospital since sunrise, with operating rooms, laboratories and other emergency departments targeted by strikes and set ablaze.
He added that there were growing fears for the safety of medics such as Hossam Abu Safiya, the head of the hospital, due to Israel’s deliberate targeting of healthcare workers.
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Meanwhile, a medical worker inside the hospital said that there was a palpable fear inside the main building after Israeli forces switched off oxygen supplies and began forcing medics and patients out in the streets.
The weather in Gaza has plummeted in recent days with at least four infants dying of hypothermia due to Israel’s blockade on food, water, and essential winter supplies.
Earlier, footage sent to MEE showed an Israeli quadcopter dropping explosives on a section of the facility whilst cries for help rang out. It was unclear if there were any fatalities in Friday’s attacks.
The assault on Kamal Adwan comes a day after 50 Palestinians were killed in an air strike on a building in the hospital’s grounds. At least five medical staff were killed in Thursday’s attack, along with their wives, parents and children.
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Kamal Adwan has been under a suffocating Israeli siege for more than two months, receiving little to no aid, medicine, food or fuel since Israel intensified it blockade on northern parts of the enclave.
The other two hospitals, the Indonesian hospital and al-Awda hospital, ceased operations weeks ago due to ongoing Israeli attacks.
Kamal Adwan remained operational at minimal capacity, offering life-saving services to newborn infants in neonatal intensive care units and other patients in ICUs.
The Israeli military intensified its offensive on northern Gaza on 5 October after a controversial proposal named the “Generals’ Plan” was presented to the Israeli government.
The plan said areas north of the Netzarim Corridor, which cuts Gaza in two, should be emptied of its residents so Israel could establish a “closed military zone”.
According to the plan, anyone who chose to stay would be considered a Hamas operative and could be killed.
Since launching the plan, Israeli forces have been accused of exacerbating starvation and malnutrition to ethnically cleanse Palestinians, with Oxfam reporting earlier this week that only 12 aid trucks had made it into northern Gaza this month.
The Israeli military has also been accused of deliberately destroying Gaza’s health system through constant attacks on hospitals, ambulances, and doctors, since the 7 October Hamas-led attack on southern Israel.
Israeli forces previously raided the strip’s two largest hospitals, the al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City and Naser hospital in Khan Younis, destroying them in the process.
They have also killed more than 1,150 health workers and detained 300 since the war on Gaza began, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
Last month, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.
