[News] Gaza authorities say hundreds killed in Israeli air raid on hospital

[Anti-Imperialist News]

 Gaza authorities say hundreds killed in Israeli air raid on hospital

*Palestinian health ministry says that at least 500 people have been killed
in an attack on a hospital in central Gaza.*
[image: Aftermath of deadly Israeli air raid on al-Ahli Arab Hospital]
Aftermath of deadly Israeli air raid on al-Ahli Arab Hospital [Abdelhakim
Abu Riash/Al Jazeera]
Published On 17 Oct 2023 -
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/17/gaza-authorities-say-hundreds-killed-in-israeli-air-raid-on-hospital
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Hundreds of people have been killed in an Israeli air raid on a hospital in
the besieged Gaza Strip, according to Palestinian authorities.

The health ministry in Gaza said on Tuesday that at least 500 people were
killed in the air raid on Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in central Gaza.

The Hamas group, which governs the Palestinian territory, said the attack
was a “war crime”.

Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari said there were no details on the
hospital deaths.

“We will get the details and update the public. I don’t know to say whether
it was an Israeli air strike,” he said.

Images shared on social media appeared to show fire engulfing the building,
widespread damage and bodies scattered in the wreckage.

Since Israel began pounding Gaza from the air on October 7, tens of
thousands of people seeking refuge from the bombardment
<https://www.aljazeera.com/program/newsfeed/2023/10/17/israeli-forces-bomb-gaza-areas-where-they-told-1m-people-to-go>
have fled to hospitals throughout Gaza.

The World Health Organization condemned the attack and demanded the
immediate protection of civilians and health care in the Palestinian
enclave.

“WHO strongly condemns the attack on Al Ahli Arab Hospital”, the UN health
agency’s director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on the social
media platform X.

Egypt said it denounced the attack “in the strongest terms”. Canadian Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau said, “It’s not acceptable to hit a hospital”.

Reporting from Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum said the area where the
air raid hit was “full of displaced people”.

“This area [where the bombing occurred] is densely populated, full of
commercial shops, residential buildings, and even was full of displaced
people who have evacuated their houses after receiving orders from the IOF
to evacuate,” said Azzoum.

“Those people have been evacuated from the northern area, they just only
moved to the central area of the Gaza Strip, to this hospital, because they
believed that this hospital was quite safe to be away from the Israeli
bombardment.”

Medical and rescue workers have previously raised alarm over what they say
is a pattern of deliberate targeting
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/12/war-crime-gaza-medics-say-israel-targeting-ambulances-health-facilities>
of medical vehicles by Israeli attacks.

“When ambulances are trying to reach areas under fire, they are targeted as
a message that no one should get inside to evacuate injured or stuck
people,” Sohaib Safi, medical coordinator for Doctors Without Borders
(Medecins Sans Frontieres, or MSF) in Gaza, told Al Jazeera earlier last
week.

The attack on the hospital comes amid a continuing barrage of Israeli air
raids
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/17/israel-bombs-homes-in-southern-gaza-kills-more-than-70-people>
that have killed more than 3,000 people and reduced entire neighbourhoods
in Gaza to rubble, according to Palestinian officials.

Israel launched the assault on Gaza after Hamas fighters carried out a
surprise attack from the territory on southern Israel. At least 1,400
people, mostly civilians, were killed in the Hamas attack, according to
Israeli officials and at least 199 others were taken as hostages.

The devastating attack on the hospital comes on the eve of a trip to Israel
by US President Joe Biden. The visit is expected to see him reaffirm US
backing for Israel and try to stop the Israel-Hamas war from spiralling
into wider conflict.
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