South Lebanon has had at least four hospitals closed since yesterday due to Israeli airstrikes, hospital officials say, severely limiting health coverage for the rest of the population there.
At the Marjayoun government hospital, a core team of 20 doctors and nurses remained on duty for days after the rest of the 120-strong staff stopped coming to work due to Israeli strikes, officials said, but the hospital was eventually closed on Friday after a direct hit that suffered.
The hospital’s director, Dr Mounes Kalakis, told the BBC he had no choice but to cut services after the bombing hit two ambulances at the hospital’s entrance, killing seven paramedics.
“We held out as long as we could,” he said. “But the nurses and doctors were terrified after the hit. We tried to calm them down and continue, but it was not possible.”
The hospital’s emergency manager, Dr. Shoshana Mazraani, said she heard the screams of health workers who were hit. She ran towards the damaged ambulances, but was warned to stay behind by her colleagues who feared a follow-up strike.
The hospital’s closure on Friday was a “tragedy for the region”, Dr Mazraani said.
“We serve a huge population here, many villages. We had 45 hospital beds, all now empty. We were the only hospital providing hemodialysis in the area. We had to turn emergency patients away and tell others to leave.”
At least 37 health care facilities have been closed in the past two weeks since Israel began bombing Lebanon, according to the World Health Organization.
In a statement late Friday, the Israeli military accused Hezbollah of using medical vehicles to transport fighters and weapons. An “argument” he often used for the strikes that destroyed the hospitals in Gaza
Israeli attack on a mosque
Israel’s military said today it struck Hezbollah fighters inside a mosque in southern Lebanon, the first such strike since the border fire between the Islamist group and the Israeli army began about a year ago.
“Yesterday, at night…the air force hit Hezbollah terrorists operating in a command center located inside a mosque, next to the Salah Ghadour hospital, in southern Lebanon,” the army said.
“The command center was used by Hezbollah terrorists to plan and carry out terrorist attacks against” the Israeli army, according to the same statement.
Last night, Lebanon’s national news agency reported that the perimeter of the Salah Ghadour hospital was targeted by “Israeli artillery”. Mohammed Sleiman, director of the hospital, which is run by the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Committee, told AFP that seven medical staff had been wounded by gunfire at the hospital, adding that the building had been evacuated.
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