Israeli forces have withdrawn from Kamal Adwan Hospital after detaining dozens of medics and some patients, and causing widespread damage to one of the last functioning hospitals in northern Gaza, the Health Ministry in the besieged enclave has said.
The medical facility is in disarray after it was raided and shelled amid Israel’s three-week offensive in the north, with a top Gaza Health Ministry official urging the World Health Organization (WHO) to evacuate the wounded from the hospital considered a lifeline for people in northern Gaza.
The smell of death has spread around the hospital,” Marwan al-Hams, director of field hospitals at Gaza’s Health Ministry, told Al Jazeera, adding that the Israeli forces destroyed the hospital’s medical supplies during their raid to prevent the medics from saving the wounded.
More than 600 people, including patients and those accompanying them were housed in the hospital before it was raided on Friday.
Medics said on Saturday that at least 44 out of the hospital’s 70-member team had been detained by the army. Later, it was reported that 14 of those detained, including the hospital’s director Hussam Abu Safia, were released.
A critical shortage of medical supplies, compounded by severely limited access, are depriving people of life-saving care,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO chief, posted on X on Saturday.
Outside the hospital, hundreds of spent bullet cartridges littered the floor. Footage shared by the Health Ministry revealed damage to buildings and vandalised wards.
Nurse Mayssoun Alian said Israeli forces surrounded the hospital in the morning “and there was shooting from all directions.