IN its latest assault on Gaza’s decimated healthcare system, Israel has once again targeted the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza, this time with drones, as its forces are also carrying out a ground offensive in the north and south of the bombarded territory.
Health officials said late on Sunday that fighting around the Indonesian Hospital in Gaza and an Israeli military “siege” forced it to shut down.
It was the main medical facility in the north after Israeli air strikes last year also forced the Kamal Adwan and Beit Hanoon hospitals to stop providing health services.
“There is direct targeting on the hospital including the intensive care unit,” Indonesian Hospital director Dr Marwan al-Sultan said in a statement, adding that no one could reach the facility, which had about 30 patients and 15 medical staff inside.
Israel has repeatedly targeted hospitals during its 19-month war on Gaza. Human rights groups and United Nations-backed experts have accused Israel of systematically destroying Gaza’s healthcare system.
Earlier, Dr Muhammad Abu Salmiya, director of al-Shifa Hospital in the besieged enclave’s north, told Al Jazeera on Sunday that the latest strikes – which have been ongoing since Saturday – indicate that Israeli attacks on Gaza’s hospitals are intensifying.
“The medical teams are really suffering, and we have a few numbers of medical teams and staff … and a lot of people are in need [of] more medical care,” Abu Salmiya said by phone from the hospital on Sunday.
Thousands of sick and wounded people could die, he warned. Blood donations are urgently needed.
This has been underscored by Gaza’s Health Ministry, which confirmed that Israeli forces besieged the facility in Beit Lahiya, adding that “a state of panic and confusion is prevailing”.
The ministry later said that Israel had cut off the arrival of patients and staff, “effectively forcing the hospital out of service”.
With “the shutdown of the Indonesian Hospital, all public hospitals in the North Gaza Governorate are now out of service”, it said.
Gaza’s healthcare facilities have been targeted repeatedly throughout Israel’s deadly assault that began 18 months ago.
