The Israeli military’s repeated and apparently unlawful attacks on medical facilities, personnel, and transport are further destroying Gaza’s healthcare system.
These attacks should be investigated as war crimes.
Despite the Israeli military’s claims of “Hamas’s cynical use of hospitals,” no evidence put forward would justify depriving hospitals and ambulances of their protected status under international humanitarian law.
The World Health Organization has reported that at least 521 people, including 16 medical workers, have been killed in 137 “attacks on health care” in Gaza as of November 12. These attacks, alongside Israel’s decisions to cut off electricity and water and block humanitarian aid to Gaza, have severely impeded health care access.
Hospitals have run out of medicine and basic equipment, and doctors have told Human Rights Watch that they were forced to operate without anesthesia and to use vinegar as an antiseptic.
One doctor at Nasser Medical Center told HRW: “At 3 a.m. I dealt with a 60-year-old woman with a cut wound in her head. I can’t make a suture to heal her wound—no gloves, no equipment—so we have to use unsterile techniques.”
Israeli forces on several occasions struck well-marked ambulances, killing and wounding at least a dozen people in one incident on November 3, including children, outside al-Shifa hospital.
Additionally, health workers at Gaza’s hospitals told Human Rights Watch they are dealing with unprecedented numbers of injured patients. Also, thousands of internally displaced people sheltering at hospitals have been put at risk.
Hospitals and other medical facilities are civilian objects that have special protections under international humanitarian law, or the laws of war, and all warring parties must take constant care to minimize harm to civilians.
Read More
Also, a communications blackout in Gaza is in effect due to fuel shortage. Read more here.