Gaza sees tense day of fighting in as international community waffles on cease-fire
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Fighting raged in the streets surrounding the largest hospital in Gaza City Saturday as the facility itself ran out of fuel and went dark.
Israel Defense Forces vehemently denied laying siege to the Al-Shifa Hospital, which they say sits on top of a major hub of tunnels dug by Hamas, and pledged to help evacuate babies from the crippled facility on Sunday.
Israeli military official told CNN troops were engaged in “ongoing intense fighting” against Hamas near the Al-Shifa Hospital, which has about 1,500 patients and an equal number of medical personnel, and between 15,000 and 20,000 civilians are sheltering from the fighting,
IDF Spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari dismissed what he called “false reports” that the hospital was a target.
“We are fighting terrorists who are choosing to fight from close to Shifa Hospital,” he said, according to The Times of Israel.
“There has been a lot of misinformation from Gaza today. So I want to clarify the facts. There is no siege, I repeat no siege, on Shifa Hospital. The east side of the hospital is open for the safe passage of Gazans who wish to leave the hospital,” Hagari said.
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A hospital spokesman said two premature babies died and 37 others were at risk after the facility lost power, Al Jazeera reported.
“We’re speaking directly and regularly with the hospital staff,” Hagari said.
“The staff of Shifa Hospital has requested that tomorrow we will help the babies in the pediatric department to get to a safer hospital. We will provide the assistance needed.”
Another patient was killed when an Israeli shell struck the intensive care unit, hospital spokesperson Ashraf Al-Qidra said Saturday.
“All I can say is that we’ve started to lose lives. Patients are dying by the minute, victims, and wounded are also dying – even babies in the incubators,” added Muhammad Abu Salmiya, the Al-Shifa Hospital director, Israeli news outlet Haaretz reported.
The hospital – the largest in Gaza City – is officially without power, internet, water, and is running short of medical supplies, he said.
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The dire predicament prompted the International Committee of the Red Cross to speak out and lament that the health system in Gaza had reached a “point of no return” following over a month of fighting.
“Overstretched, running on thin supplies and increasingly unsafe, the healthcare system in Gaza has reached a point of no return risking the lives of thousands of wounded, sick and displaced people,” the ICRC warned.
Israeli tanks were reportedly closing in on a second hospital where 14,000 displaced people are sheltering.
In other developments:
- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pushed back on French President Emmanuel Macron’s claims that there is “no justification” for Israel’s ongoing siege of civilians in Gaza over one month after Hamas invaded southern Israel and killed 1,400 people.
“A cease-fire with Hamas means surrender,” Netanyahu insisted, adding that he believes any civilian casualties in Gaza are Hamas’ fault.
“Hamas-ISIS is cruelly holding hostages – women, children and the elderly – which is a crime against humanity,” he said.
“Hamas-ISIS uses schools, mosques and hospitals as terror headquarters.”
“The crimes that Hamas-ISIS is committing today in Gaza will be committed tomorrow in Paris, New York and everywhere else in the world. World leaders must condemn Hamas-ISIS and not Israel.”
- Social media posts on Saturday showed Hamas firing on Gaza civilians who were attempted to move to the south during pauses in the fighting. About 50,000 people are believed to have evacuated Northern Gaza and moved south during pauses in the fighting.
- The IDF said Saturday that five more Israeli soldiers died in the Gaza fighting Friday, including four who were killed when a booby trap in a tunnel near them went off. That brought the total of slain soldiers to 42 since the operation began.
- Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah seized on the fissure in Israel’s relationships with Western powers in a fiery statement boasting about the mounting global pressure on Israel’s military to abandon its offensive in Gaza.
“We see thousands of people in Washington, New York, London and Paris protesting against Israel,” Nasrallah said in a speech to an Arab-Islamic summit in Saudi Arabia Saturday.
“The only voice that stands out [as an Israeli ally] is the US and its ‘follower’ the UK,” said Nasrallah, who has been the secretary-general of Hezbollah since 1992, in a videotaped address.
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Israel-Hamas war: How we got here
2005: Israel unilaterally withdraws from the Gaza Strip more than three decades after winning the territory from Egypt in the Six-Day War.
2006: Terrorist group Hamas wins a Palestinian legislative election.
2007: Hamas seizes control of Gaza in a civil war.
2008: Israel launches military offensive against Gaza after Palestinian terrorists fired rockets into the town of Sderot.
2023: Hamas launches the biggest attack on Israel in 50 years, in an early-morning ambush Oct. 7, firing thousands of rockets and sending dozens of militants into Israeli towns.
Terrorists killed more than 1,400 Israelis, wounded more than 4,200, and took at least 200 hostage.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was quick to announce, “We are at war,” and vowed Hamas would pay “a price it has never known.”
The Gaza Health Ministry — which is controlled by Hamas — reported at least 3,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 12,500 injured since the war began.
He called for increased pressure on the US.
“If you want to put an end to attacks on this secondary front [in Iraq and Syria], you must impose an end to the [Israeli] attack on Gaza,” he said in a pointed jab at the Biden administration.
- The summit – hosted by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud – later issued a statement calling for a definite halt in fighting in Gaza and demanding the world not remain silent or turn a blind eye to the suffering of Palestinians.
“The only solution for this conflict is the resistance continuing against the Israeli oppression until the establishment of the Palestinian state from the river to the sea,” Indian President Ibrahim Raisi told the attendees at the high-profile meeting in a statement that echoed the rallying cries of pro-Palestinian protestors worldwide.
“We want to take a historic and decisive decision regarding what is happening in the Palestinian territories. Killing civilians and bombing hospitals are manifestations of Israeli crimes in Gaza. Today, everyone must decide which side they stand on,” the statement said.
- Netanyahu said that IDF forces are also active on other fronts, including in the West Bank, Syria and the Red Sea.
The IDF said it was carrying out airstrikes against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon in response to missile and rocket attacks on northern Israel.
Netanyahu warned Hezbollah not to widen the war. “It will be the mistake of your lives,” he said, and would seal Lebanon’s fate.
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