29 Gazans dead in Israeli strikes around key hospital

Israeli strikes kill 29 near Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza, escalating violence as health center faces further attacks

BEIT LAHIA:

Gaza's civil defence agency said 29 people were killed on Friday by Israeli strikes around a major hospital in the northern city of Beit Lahia.

Kamal Adwan Hospital, one of northern Gaza's last functioning health centres, was hit by several strikes in the morning, the agency and the hospital director said.

"There was a series of air strikes on the northern and western sides of the hospital, accompanied by intense and direct fire," said hospital director Hossam Abu Safieh, adding that four staff were killed.

Mahmud Bassal, the civil defence agency's spokesman, said, "At least 29 people were killed and dozens were wounded... since dawn on Friday as a result of the continuing Israeli shelling around Kamal Adwan Hospital."

The Israeli army has not yet responded to AFP requests for comment on the strikes.

Bassal told AFP that the Israeli army entered the hospital, evacuated patients and arrested several Palestinians.

Abu Safieh said that following the latest raid, no surgeons were left at the facility.

Beit Lahia has been the site of an intense Israeli military operation for the past two months that has again escalated in recent days, forcing thousands to flee amid bombing, the civil defence agency said.

Israeli forces have stormed the Kamal Adwan on several occasions since the start of the war nearly 14 months ago. The hospital said its intensive care unit director Ahmad al-Kahlut was killed in an air strike late last month.

The latest strikes came just days after the UN's World Health Organization said an emergency medical team had reached the hospital for the first time in 60 days.

Dr Faradina Sulistiyani, a surgeon on the team, told AFP from Gaza City that all seven of her team members left the premises on foot as the bombing went on.

Rik Peeperkorn, WHO representative in the Palestinian territories, told reporters from Geneva he had "extremely concerning information" from the Kamal Adwan.

He said the Israeli army was first spotted outside the hospital at 4:00 am (0200 GMT).

He said that the international medical team said that "panic caused by the bombing and shelling, along with the panicked crowd inside the hospital" caused Gazans and the team to leave the hospital despite there being "no official evacuation order".

Peeperkorn said that a "substantial amount" of people including patients and staff remained in the hospital, which is still "minimum operational".