Northern Gaza hospitals are attacked again, even though they were already damaged by previous Israeli raids

Their purpose was to aid in the recovery of individuals. But once more, Israeli troops are firing on and surrounding three hospitals in northern Gaza.
Israel is initiating a fresh assault on Hamas fighters it claims have gathered nearby, with bombs striking them forcefully. The war, which has targeted hospitals in a way uncommon in modern fighting, continues to haunt the staff as they diligently treat waves of injured people.

Israeli troops launched attacks and sieges on all three hospitals approximately a decade ago. While efforts to repair the damage to the Kamal Adwan, Al-Awda, and Indonesian hospitals continue, they remain the only partially operational hospitals in the area.
In wars, medical facilities are often attacked, but the people involved generally say that it was an accident or an isolated case because hospitals are protected by international law. During its year-long operation in Gaza, Israel has stood out by attacking hospitals openly. It has besieged and raided at least 10 hospitals across the Gaza Strip, some more than once, and has also hit many others with airstrikes.

It has stated that destroying Hamas after the October 7, 2023 attacks is a military necessity. Hamas uses hospitals as “command and control bases” to plan strikes, hide fighters, and ensure the safety of hostages. It asserts that this deprives hospitals of their legal rights.

In an interview with The Associated Press in January, after the first round of hospital raids, Israeli military spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said of Hamas, “If we want to take down the military infrastructure in the north, we have to take down the philosophy of (using) the hospitals.”

Most notably, Israel twice raided Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital, which is the largest medical center in the strip. They created a video animation that depicted the hospital as a significant Hamas base, although the validity of the evidence they used remains under scrutiny.

But the focus on Shifa has made raids on other sites less important. It took the AP months to gather reports on the raids on Al-Awda, Indonesian, and Kamal Adwan Hospitals. They talked to more than thirty patients, witnesses, medical and humanitarian workers, and Israeli officials.

It found that Israel had not shown much or any proof of a strong Hamas presence in those situations. The AP gave the office of the Israeli military spokesman a dossier with a list of the events that the people it interviewed told them about. The office said it couldn’t say anything about individual events.

“A death sentence” at Al-Awda Hospital
There have been no claims by the Israeli forces that Hamas is present at Al-Awda. When asked about the information that led troops to surround and raid the hospital last year, the military spokesman’s office did not respond.
Israeli troops’ fighting in the nearby Jabalia refugee camp has forced the hospital to close again in recent weeks, leaving parts of northern Gaza without access to food, water, or medical supplies. Last month, Mohammed Salha, the head of the facility, stated that the surrounding troops prevented the evacuation of six critically ill patients. He said that the staff only ate one meal a day, which was usually just some flat bread or rice.

As more war veterans came in, doctors were working hard to treat them even though they were tired. Doctors often have to amputate limbs broken by gunfire to save lives, as there are no neurosurgeons or vascular surgeons remaining north of Gaza City.
Salha said, “We are living the nightmares of November and December of last year all over again, but this time they are worse.” “We have less medicine and supplies, and we have less faith that something will be done to stop this.”
In response to a specific question about the Al-Awda hospital, the military stated that they take all necessary precautions to prevent civilian injuries.

On November 21, 2018, as fighting raged around Al-Awda, a shell exploded in the building’s operating room. Doctors Without Borders, an international charity, said it had told the Israeli military where to find Dr. Mahmoud Abu Nujaila, two other doctors, and a patient’s uncle. They all died almost quickly.

Dr. Mohammed Obeid, who worked with Abu Nujaila, remembered dodging bullets inside the hospital building. Hospital officials say that sniper fire from Israel killed a nurse, two cleaners, and hurt a surgeon.
By December 5, it was centered around Al-Awda. Obeid stated that staying in Al-Awda for 18 days was akin to receiving a death sentence.

At least four times, survivors and medical staff said that Israeli drones or snipers killed or seriously hurt Palestinians who were trying to get in. The staff reported that they shot and killed two women who were about to give birth in the street. Salha, the manager, witnessed his cousin Souma and her 6-year-old son succumb to gunfire while she was transporting the boy to receive medical attention for his wounds.

Shaza Al-Shouraim was in such intense pain that it took her an hour to walk to Al-Awda for her delivery. Her mother-in-law and her 16-year-old brother-in-law raised flags. “Civilians!” Khatam Sharir’s mother-in-law kept yelling. A burst of gunshots killed Sharir just outside the gate.

Forces stormed the hospital on December 23, ordering men between the ages of 15 and 65 to undress and face interrogation in the courtyard. After soldiers cut off Mazen Khalidi’s infected right leg, he reported that nurses pleaded with them to allow him to rest, rather than accompany the handcuffed and blinded men outside. They said no, and he limped downstairs with his stump bleeding.
Khalidi said, “The shame scared me more than death.”

Israeli troops captured Ahmed Muhanna, the hospital’s manager, and no one knows where he is now. During the raid, Israeli troops also arrested Orthopedist Adnan Al-Bursh, one of the best doctors in Gaza, who died in Israeli prison in May.
Upon dismantling the November shelling, the staff discovered a message that Abu Nujaila had scrawled on a whiteboard several weeks prior.

It stated in English, “Anyone who stays until the end will tell the story.” “We did what we could.” “Remember us.”
At a hospital in Indonesia, patients are dying right in front of your eyes.
Staff at Indonesian Hospital said that on October 18, artillery hit the top floors a few blocks away. People ran away to protect themselves. Israeli troops had already surrounded them, trapping the doctors and patients inside without sufficient food, water, or supplies.

“There are more bombs around us now.” “They’ve stopped us,” an Indonesian worker named Edi Wahyudi said.
According to Muhannad Hadi, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian areas, two patients died due to a lack of power and supplies.

According to Tamer Al-Kurd, a nurse at the hospital, there are currently only two doctors remaining and approximately 44 patients. He stated that his thirst was so intense that he was starting to see visions. “People come to me for help.” “With two doctors, I can’t do that by myself,” he uttered in a feeble tone. “I’m worn out.”

The Israeli military said on Saturday that it had helped 29 patients from hospitals in Indonesia and Al-Awda get to safety.
The Indonesian is Northern Gaza’s largest hospital. Israel’s siege in the autumn of 2023 left its top floors charred, its walls marked with shrapnel, and its gates littered with heaped rubble.

Before the assault, the Israeli army claimed an underground command-and-control center lay beneath the hospital. It released blurry satellite images of what it said was a tunnel entrance in the yard and a rocket launchpad nearby, outside the hospital compound.
The Indonesia-based group that funds the hospital denied any Hamas presence. “If a tunnel existed, we would be aware of it.” We know this building because we built it brick by brick, layer by layer. It’s ridiculous,” Arief Rachman, a hospital manager from the Indonesia-based Medical Emergency Rescue Committee, told the AP last month.

After besieging and raiding the hospital, the military did not mention or show evidence of the underground facility or tunnels it had earlier claimed. When asked if any tunnels were found, the military spokesperson’s office did not reply.
It released images of two vehicles found in the compound—aa pickup truck with military vests and a bloodstained car belonging to an abducted Israeli, suggesting he had been brought to the hospital on Oct. 7. Hamas has said it brought wounded hostages to hospitals for treatment.

During the siege, Israeli shelling crept closer and closer until, on Nov. 20, it hit the Indonesian’s second floor, killing 12 people and wounding dozens, according to staff. Israel said troops responded to “enemy fire” from the hospital but denied using shells.
Gunfire over the next few days hit walls and whizzed through intensive care. Explosions sparked fires outside the hospital courtyard, where some 1,000 displaced Palestinians sheltered, according to staff. The Israeli military denied targeting the hospital, although it acknowledged nearby bombardment may have damaged it.

For three weeks, a facility that could only accommodate 200 wounded patients a day was inundated with up to 500 wounded individuals per day. Supplies hadn’t entered in weeks. Bloodstained linens piled up. Doctors, some working 24-hour shifts, ate a few dates a day. The discovery of moldy flour on Nov. 23 was almost thrilling.
Without medicines or ventilators, there was little doctors could do. Wounds became infected. Doctors said they performed dozens of amputations on infected limbs. Medics estimated a fifth of incoming patients died. At least 60 corpses lay in the courtyard. A nearby playground housed others.

“To see patients dying before your eyes because you don’t have the ability to help them, you have to ask yourself, ‘Where is humanity?’” asked Dergham Abu Ibrahim, a volunteer.
Kamal Adwan: ‘This makes no sense.’

Kamal Adwan Hospital, once a linchpin of northern Gaza’s health system, was burning on Thursday of last week.
Israeli shells crashed into the third floor, igniting a fire that destroyed medical supplies, according to the World Health Organization, which had delivered the equipment just days before. The artillery hit water tanks and damaged the dialysis unit, badly burning four medics who tried to extinguish the blaze, said the hospital’s director, Hossam Abu Safiya.
In videos pleading for help over the past weeks, Abu Safiya had fought to maintain his composure as Israeli forces surrounded the hospital. But last weekend, there were tears in his eyes.

“Everything we have built, they have burned,” he said, his voice cracking. “They burned our hearts. They killed my son.”
On Oct. 25, Israeli troops stormed the hospital after what an Israeli military official described as an intense fight with militants nearby. During the battle, Israeli fire targeted the hospital’s oxygen tanks because they “can be booby traps,” the official said.
Israeli forces withdrew after three days, during which Palestinian health officials said nearly all of Kamal Adwan’s medical workers were detained, an Israeli drone killed at least one doctor, and two children in intensive care died when generators stopped working.
Days later, a drone struck Abu Safiya’s son in nearby Jabalia. Israeli snipers had wounded the 21-year-old during the first military raid on Kamal Adwan last December. Now he is buried in the yard of the hospital, where just Abu Safiya and one other doctor remain to treat the dozens of wounded pouring in each day from new strikes in Jabalia.

The Israeli military said troops detained 100 people, some who were “posing as medical staff.” The military reported that soldiers stripped the men to check for weapons, and then sent those deemed militants to detention camps. The military claimed that the hospital was “fully operational, with all departments continuing to treat patients.” It released footage of several guns and an RPG launcher with several rounds; it said it was found inside the hospital.

Kamal Adwan staff say more than 30 medical personnel remain detained, including the head of nursing, who is employed by MedGlobal, an American organization that sends medical teams to disaster regions, and Dr. Mohammed Obeid, the surgeon employed by Doctors without Borders who previously worked at Al-Awda Hospital and had moved to Kamal Adwan.
The turmoil echoed Israel’s nine-day siege of Kamal Adwan last December. On Dec. 12, soldiers entered and allowed police dogs to attack staff, patients, and others, multiple witnesses said. Ahmed Atbail, a 36-year-old who had sought refuge at the hospital, said he saw a dog bite off one man’s finger.

Witnesses said the troops ordered boys and men, ranging from their mid-teens to 60, to line up outside crouched in the cold, blindfolded, and nearly naked for hours of interrogation. Mohammed Al-Masri, a detained lawyer, said that every time someone lifted their heads, they suffered beatings.

The military later published footage of men exiting the hospital. Al-Masri identified himself in the footage. He said soldiers staged the images, ordering men to lay down rifles belonging to the hospital guards as if they were militants surrendering. Israel said all photos released are authentic and that it apprehended dozens of suspected militants.
After interrogating some of the men, soldiers opened fire on them as they attempted to reenter the hospital, resulting in five injuries, according to three detainees. Ahmed Abu Hajjaj recalled hearing bursts of gunfire as he made his way back in the dark. “I thought, this makes no sense—who would they be shooting at?” he recalled.

Witnesses also said a bulldozer lumbered into the hospital compound, plowing buildings. Soldiers held Abu Safiya, Abu Hajjaj, and Al-Masri inside the hospital while they heard people screaming outside.
After the soldiers withdrew, the men noticed that the bulldozer had crushed the tents that had previously sheltered approximately 2,500 people. Most of the displaced had evacuated, but Abu Safiya said he found the bodies of four people crushed, with splints from recent treatment in the hospital still on their limbs.

Asked about the incident, the Israeli military spokesman’s office said: “Lies were spread on social media” about troops’ activities at the hospital. The statement claimed the discovery of previously buried bodies, unrelated to the military’s activities.
Later, the military said Hamas used the hospital as a command center but produced no evidence. It said soldiers uncovered weapons, but it showed footage only of a single pistol.

The hospital’s director, Dr. Ahmed Al-Kahlout, remains in Israeli custody. The military released footage of him under interrogation, saying he was a Hamas agent and that militants were based in the hospital. His colleagues said he spoke under duress.
The fallout
Hagari, the military spokesperson, said hospitals “provide a life of their own… to the (Hamas) war system.” He stated that tunnels connected hospitals, enabling fighters to move freely. “And when you take it, they have no way to move. They cannot move from the south to the north.

Despite frequently suggesting that hospitals are linked to Hamas’ underground networks, the military has only revealed one tunnel shaft from all the hospitals it raided—one that leads to Shifa’s grounds.

In a report last month, a UN investigation commission determined that “Israel has implemented a concerted policy to destroy the health-care system of Gaza.” It described Israeli actions at hospitals as “collective punishment against the Palestinians in Gaza.”
Some patients now fear hospitals, refusing to go to them or leaving before treatment is complete. “They are places of death,” Ahmed Al-Qamar, a 35-year-old economist in Jabalia refugee camp, said of his fear of taking his children to the hospital. “You can feel it.”
Zaher Sahloul, the president of MedGlobal, who has also worked in Gaza during the war, said the sense of safety that should surround hospitals has been destroyed.
“This war has become a scar in the minds of every doctor and nurse.”