2023-11-11 07:24:00
Calls for restraint are increasing in the face of intensifying fighting around hospitals in Gaza, as the war triggered by the deadly Hamas attack in Israel on October 7 enters its sixth week on Saturday.
Violent fighting between Israeli troops and fighters from the Islamist organization continued around al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, the largest in the territory, an AFP correspondent reported.
The NGO Doctors Without Borders (MSF) also noted on Saturday morning on inside the establishment.
On Friday, Hamas reported 13 dead in a strike on this complex where civilians tried to take refuge, as in other hospitals in the territory.
Quoted by MSF, a nurse at the establishment, Maher Sharif, described a “horror scene”. “I saw dead bodies, including women and children,” she said.
Before the UN Security Council, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, renewed his calls for a ceasefire on Friday, stressing that the strip’s health system of Gaza is “on its knees”.
“The situation on the ground is impossible to describe: hospital corridors crowded with wounded, sick and dying people, overflowing morgues, surgeries without anesthesia,” he testified.
“No justification”
French President Emmanuel Macron “urged Israel to stop” the bombings killing civilians, in an interview with the BBC. “These babies, these women, these elderly people are being bombed and killed.” There is “no justification” and “no legitimacy for this,” he said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reacted by emphasizing that “responsibility for any harm done to civilians lies with Hamas”, which according to him uses them as “human shields” and which started the war on October 7.
Around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, died following the unprecedented attack on Israeli territory perpetrated by the Islamist organization, according to a downwardly revised Israeli toll.
The retaliatory bombings carried out by Israel have since left 11,078 dead in the Gaza Strip, mainly civilians, including 4,506 children, according to the Hamas Ministry of Health.
The ministry on Friday called on the international community to “immediately intervene to prevent hospitals in Gaza from continuing to be targeted” and invited “all international institutions” to go to al-Shifa hospital to “protect it “.
“All hospitals in Gaza City were targeted” on Friday by the Israeli army, the director of al-Shifa hospital, Mohammed Abou Salmiya, assured AFP.
Summit in Riyadh
The Israeli army has not commented on these claims but said Friday that it would “kill” Hamas fighters “who fire from hospitals” in Gaza. She said in the evening that she had eliminated “around 150 terrorists”.
In total, 20 of the territory’s 36 hospitals are no longer operational, according to the UN agency responsible for humanitarian coordination (Ocha), even as the number of injured increases daily.
On Friday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken acknowledged that there was “still much to do” to protect civilians in Gaza.
Saudi Arabia is organizing an emergency summit of the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Riyadh on Saturday, during which Arab leaders and the Iranian president are expected to call on Israel to end his offensive in Gaza.
Shelled relentlessly for more than a month and subjected to a total siege, the small Palestinian territory where 1.6 of the 2.4 million inhabitants have been displaced according to the UN is plunged into a catastrophic humanitarian situation.
More and more residents are resolving to leave the city of Gaza in ruins, where basic foodstuffs are lacking.
Israel agreed to make daily humanitarian “breaks” to allow civilians to flee to the more spared south of the territory via a “corridor”.
This was again used on Friday by 30,000 people despite “explosions” which caused deaths there, according to OCHA.
Among these refugees was Mounir al-Raï, who came from the huge Shati refugee camp where, he said, “houses collapsed on their inhabitants” under the effect of Israeli fire.
Stop the “carnage”
The director of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, called on Friday for an end to the “carnage” in the Gaza Strip.
“Razing entire neighborhoods is not a response to the heinous crimes committed by Hamas. On the contrary, it creates a new generation of aggrieved Palestinians who are likely to perpetuate the cycle of violence,” he said.
On October 7, Hamas commandos carried out a bloody attack on Israeli soil against civilians on a scale and violence never seen since the creation of Israel in 1948.
The Islamist movement, classified as a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union, also holds 239 hostages, according to the Israeli army.
The latter is waging fierce battles against Hamas in the heart of Gaza City, where, according to it, the “center” of the Palestinian movement’s infrastructure is located, entrenched in a network of tunnels.
For years, Israel has accused Hamas of using hospitals to carry out attacks or hide tunnels, and civilians as human shields, which the movement denies.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said Israeli snipers fired on al-Quds hospital on Friday, leaving at least one dead.
“No water”
Hundreds of thousands of refugees are now crowded into the south of the territory, in disastrous conditions.
“We have no water, no toilets, no bakery,” says Oum Alaa al-Hajin, who found refuge in the al-Nasser hospital in the town of Khan Younes after days of walking. .
The territory has been deprived of water, electricity, food and medicine due to the total siege imposed by Israel since October 9.
Meanwhile, rockets continue to be fired daily from the Gaza Strip towards Israel, where sirens sounded in Tel Aviv on Friday. Two women were injured by shrapnel, according to emergency services.
Israel is facing “multiple fronts,” army spokesman Richard Hecht said Friday.
The Israeli army announced that it had intercepted three drones heading towards its territory on Thursday, and struck Syria on Friday after a drone fell on a school in southern Israel.
She also indicated “to continue its operations to destroy the infrastructure” of Hezbollah in Lebanon, with which exchanges of fire are daily. The pro-Iranian movement reported on Friday the death of seven of its fighters killed by Israel.
11/11/2023 06:22:41 – Gaza Strip (Palestinian Territories) (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
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