Gaza: Hospitals Turning into Mass Grave

Manas Dasgupta

NEW DELHI, Nov 14: While the Israel’s security forces claim that Gaza’s Rantisi hospital sits atop a Hamas operated tunnel, the Al Shifa hospital authorities accusing Israel of inhuman treatment maintained that the entire hospital had turned into “mass grave” because of blockade of all facilities by the Israeli army.

Amid criticism that their ground operations have left medical facilities inoperative in the blockaded strip, Al Shifa hospital chief Mohammad Abu Salmiyah said on Tuesday said Gaza’s biggest hospital has buried 179 people, including babies, in a “mass grave” inside its compound underlining the catastrophic humanitarian crisis in the region. “We were forced to bury them in a mass grave,” the hospital director said.

Seven babies and 29 patients from the intensive care unit were buried after the hospital’s fuel supplies ran out. “There are bodies littered in the hospital complex. There is no more electricity…” A journalist said the stench of decomposing bodies was everywhere. A surgeon at the hospital, working with Doctors Without Borders, called the situation “inhuman.” “We don’t have electricity. There’s no water. There’s no food.”

The Israeli army sources said the tunnel was next to the house of a Hamas operative who heads the naval operations of Hamas that led the October 7 raids on Israel. Rantisi hospital is only 183 metres away, said Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, as he sought to prove the accusations that the Palestinian Hamas group has been operating from hospitals. “Inside these tunnels, Hamas terrorists hide, operate and hold Israeli hostages against their will,” said the Israel Security Forces on X.

The tunnel is electrified with the help of solar panels and leads to a bulletproof and explosives-proof door about 20 metres down the ground level, he said. “It looks like a hard and clear evidence that the hospital is connected,” he added. The tunnel remains covered so that no one can find it and the hospital is next to a school and an UN building, a spokesman of the Israeli forces said.

“Hamas is using hospitals…people shooting RPGs from hospitals. This is Hamas. The world has to understand who is Israel fighting against,” he asserted. Hostages were brought from across the Gaza border on bike and held hostage in this basement of the hospital, he claimed, pointing to a bike with bullet marks. Women’s clothes, ropes tied to a chair, diapers, and a feeding bottle in the basement added to the “suspicion for areas where hostages were held.”

A makeshift washroom complete with a commode and ventilation were also found there. “We see infrastructure like toilets, showers and a small kitchen provided the terrorists their needs,” he said. Israel also claimed its forces were transporting incubators from hospitals in Gaza to Al-Shifa, but later deleted the social media post. In a fresh post, they claimed they are in the process of coordinating the transfer of incubators from a hospital in Israel to Gaza.

Hospitals have become the latest focal point of Israel-Hamas fight in Gaza. At least six babies and nine patients have died due to fuel shortages in hospitals and all hospitals in northern Gaza are now “out of service,” said the Hamas-run health ministry on Monday. This includes the Al-Shifa hospital, the largest in the blockaded strip.

The humanitarian situation in Gaza remains grim with hundreds of patients trapped in the hospital without electricity and water, besides thousands others who have taken shelter in those complexes. The Al Shifa Hospital is Gaza City’s largest and was cut off from the world for over 72 hours last week after a deadly blockade by Israeli forces that included tanks at the front gates; Tel Aviv insists the hospital sits atop a network of tunnels that form part of the Hamas’ underground headquarters.

The United States president Joe Biden urged Israel to protect Gaza’s main hospital saying, “It’s my hope and expectation that there will be less intrusive action relative to the hospital. The hospital must be protected.” The United Nations believes thousands, and perhaps more than 10,000 – including patients, staff and displaced civilians – may be inside Al Shifa and unable to escape because of fierce fighting nearby.

Hospitals, and medical personnel, are protected under international humanitarian law and parties in conflict must ensure their protection. They cannot be used to shield military objectives from attack, but any operation around or within must protect patients, staff, and other civilians, the United Nations’ Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in its Monday update from Gaza.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says the assault has already killed 11,240 people, most of whom are civilians and at least 40 per cent of whom were children. Israel has vowed “vengeance” for the Hamas’ October 7 terror attack that killed over 1,200, including children, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is coming under growing international pressure – after many Western nations first refused to openly criticise Tel Aviv for its brutal attacks.

Meanwhile, the Israeli police said they were investigating “several cases” of sexual violence that Hamas allegedly committed against women. The Israeli army said it had captured parliament and other government institutions run by Hamas in Gaza City. Military units “took over the Hamas parliament, the government building, the Hamas police headquarters and an engineering faculty that served as an institute for the production and development of weapons,” the army said in a statement.

Israeli police said they were investigating “several cases” of sexual violence that Hamas allegedly committed against women during the October 7 attacks, with “multiple witnesses” to incidents of rape.