GAZA: Israeli forces raided the Kamal Adwan Hospital, one of only three medical facilities on the northern edge of the Gaza Strip, on Friday, ordering dozens of patients and hundreds of others to evacuate the compound, officials said. In separate incidents across Gaza, Israeli strikes killed at least 25 people, medics said. One of those strikes on a house in Gaza City killed 15 people, medics and the civil emergency service said.
The Palestinian health ministry said contact with staff inside the facility, which has been under heavy pressure from Israeli forces for weeks, had been lost. "The occupation forces are inside the hospital now and they are burning it," Munir Al Bursh, director of the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza, said in a statement. The Israeli military said it had made efforts to mitigate harm to civilians and had "facilitated the secure evacuation of civilians, patients and medical personnel prior to the operation" but gave no details.
Kamal Adwan, as well as the Indonesia and Al Awda hospitals, have been repeatedly attacked by Israeli forces, which have been clearing out the northern edge of the Gaza Strip for weeks, Palestinian medical staff say. Friday's raid comes a day after the army evacuated the nearby Indonesian Hospital and continued to press Al Awda Hospital.
Bursh said the army had ordered 350 people inside the facility to leave to a nearby school sheltering displaced families. They included 75 patients, their companions and 185 medical staff. Palestinian Al Aqsa Television said that hours after the raid, Israeli forces set the hospital ablaze. Footage circulating on Palestinian and Arab media showed smoke rising from the area of the hospital. There was no Israeli military comment.
On Thursday, Gaza authorities said an Israeli air strike killed five Palestinian journalists in a vehicle outside a hospital but the Israeli army said the victims were militants posing as media workers. Medics said the five were among at least 31 people killed in Israeli air assaults across the Palestinian enclave before dawn as Hamas and Israel traded blame over delays in reaching a ceasefire deal after more than 14 months of fighting. The Palestinian Journalists Union said one strike killed five journalists from the Al Quds Today channel who were in a broadcast vehicle in front of Al Awda Hospital in the Al Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza
Much of the area around the northern towns of Jabalia, Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya has been cleared of people and systematically razed, fuelling speculation that Israel intends to keep the area as a closed buffer zone after the fighting in Gaza ends. Israel denies the claims saying its campaign is to prevent Hamas fighters from regrouping. On Thursday, health officials said five medical staff, including a paediatrician, were killed by Israeli fire at Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya, where Israeli forces have been operating since October.
In a statement, Hamas held Israel and the United States responsible for the fate of patients, injured people and the medical staff inside the hospital. Israel's campaign in Gaza has killed more than 45,300 Palestinians, according to health officials in the enclave. Most of the population of 2.3 million has been displaced and much of Gaza is in ruins. — Reuters
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