Crisis at Shifa Hospital in Gaza: Forced Evacuation and Tragic Conditions

Long lines of patients, doctors and nurses walked towards the sea at Gaza City on Saturday.

– We left under the threat of armed force, says Mahmoud Abu Auf on Saturday.

The AP news agency reached him by phone after he and his family left the overcrowded hospital. Palestinians describe panic and chaos after Israeli soldiers reportedly gave them one hour to leave the hospital.

– Tanks and snipers were everywhere, inside and outside, says Auf, who says he saw Israeli soldiers take three men prisoner during the evacuation.

The Israeli army denies that they were ordered to leave, although several sources at Shifa have said otherwise.

No ambulances

Among those who left the hospital were both sick and wounded, some of them with amputated limbs, as well as doctors, nurses and displaced Palestinians.

No ambulances followed them, and loud explosions continued to ring around the hospital.

Doctor Munir al-Barsh says that the Israeli soldiers asked everyone who left to wave white scarves and walk in single file.

– They were humiliated by the soldiers along the road, al-Barsh adds Al Jazeera.

Along the way, an AFP journalist saw at least 15 corpses, some of them decomposing.

Around 120 wounded are still in the hospital, in addition to an unknown number of prematurely born children, the Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip says.

Denies evacuation

Israel has previously repeatedly demanded an evacuation of the hospital, while the hospital management has replied that this is impossible as it would put patients’ lives at risk.

However, the Israeli army (IDF) denies having demanded an evacuation of the hospital on Saturday.

But an AFP journalist at the hospital says that Israeli soldiers announced over the loudspeakers that Shifa was to be evacuated “within the next hour”. The soldiers also called the director of the Shifa hospital, Mohammed Abu Salmiya, and asked him to ensure the “evacuation of patients, wounded, displaced persons and employees, and that they must go on foot towards the sea front”, says the journalist.

A doctor at the hospital also says the IDF demanded that Shifa be emptied within an hour. They are also said to have been told to head towards the sea via a road not normally used to reach the southern part of Gaza.

The doctor said it was impossible to evacuate the hospital within an hour, especially because the hospital is without ambulances needed to move seriously injured patients and premature infants.

“The military accepted a request from the director of the Shifa hospital to allow the Gazans who remained in the hospital and who wanted to evacuate to do so,” an IDF statement said.

More doctors again

Before Israeli soldiers moved into the Shifa hospital on Wednesday, the UN estimated that a total of 2,300 patients, staff and displaced persons were staying at the hospital, which is Gaza’s largest.

Doctor Ahmed El Mokhallati says that most of the staff and patients have now left Shifa, but that he is left with five other doctors.

– Many patients cannot leave the hospital because they are in intensive care beds or in incubators, says Mokhallati on social media.

It was still unclear on Saturday evening whether everyone who fled Shifa had made it to safety. Most of Gaza’s hospitals are out of order.

But doctor Ramez Rudwan and his daughter, also a doctor, arrived in southern Gaza on Saturday, reports Reuters.

– We were forced by the occupation authorities to leave Shifa, says Rudwan.

Hospital administrator Omar Zaqout describes horrific scenes outside the hospital.

– We were asked to walk along the al-Wehda road. Dozens of corpses are scattered on the road. Many homeless people who cannot walk are left to fend for themselves, Zaqout told Al Jazeera.

– Forced displacement

In recent days, Israel has asked the Palestinians to move to an even smaller area in the south of the Gaza Strip than before, at the same time that they have announced that the ground operation will be stepped up to new areas in the south, to which the Palestinians have previously been asked to go.

Aid organizations and a number of other actors have called what is happening a forced displacement, and UN experts said on Thursday that incitement to a genocide against the Palestinian people is increasing.

Israel and the US claim Hamas has a command center under the Shifa hospital. So far, no evidence has been presented for the claim, which is denied by both hospital staff and Hamas. The Palestinian group also warned on Friday that neither Israeli hostages nor prisoners of war are being held captive in hospitals in the Gaza Strip.

A doctor at the hospital told Reuters on Friday afternoon that there were still Israeli soldiers in the hospital, but that they had not yet found anything. He also warned that food and water were about to run out.

– Like a big prison

Shifa director Salmiya described the hospital on Friday as a large prison and a mass grave.

According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 24 patients in various wards have died at Shifa Hospital in two days as vital medical equipment has stopped working due to a power outage.

– Not a hospital

In an interview with the American radio channel NPR on Friday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that the Shifa hospital is not a hospital.

– There were a lot of terrorists there. They fled when our forces approached, says Netanyahu.

There have been strong reactions from both the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross after Israeli forces moved into the hospital area and continued the military operation there.

“As the carnage in Gaza reaches new, horrifying heights every day, the world continues to watch in shock as hospitals are attacked, premature babies die, and an entire population is deprived of what they need to survive,” said UN emergency chief Martin Griffiths in a statement.

[ Evakuerte norske borgere fra Gaza har landet på Gardermoen ]

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2023-11-18 20:29:51
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