Israel forcibly evacuates Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza

One of the last functioning hospitals in northern Gaza has been forcibly evacuated by the Israeli military, medics said, after dozens of people were reportedly killed in Israeli strikes targeting the area around the health facility.

Aid Sabah, head of the nursing department at Kamal Adwan Hospital, told the BBC that at around 07:00 on Friday, the military gave the administration 15 minutes to evacuate patients and staff to the yard.

Israeli troops subsequently entered the hospital and took out the remaining patients, he said.

The Israeli military announced Friday afternoon that it was conducting an operation in the area of ​​the hospital, which it called a “bastion of Hamas terrorists.”

Israeli troops “facilitated the safe evacuation of civilians, patients and medical personnel” from the hospital before starting the operation, it added.

The military did not say where the patients would be moved. But earlier in the week, an Israeli official said they intended to move those at Kamal Adwan Hospital to a nearby Indonesian hospital, which itself was evacuated by the military on Tuesday.

“It’s dangerous because there are patients in the intensive care unit who are comatose and need ventilators and moving them will put them at risk,” Dr Sabah said.

“If the Army is going to continue to take these patients out, they’re going to need specialized vehicles.”

It comes hours after hospital director Kamal Adwan said an estimated 50 people had been killed, including five medical staff, in a series of Israeli airstrikes targeting the hospital’s surroundings.

Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya’s statement said a building opposite the hospital was targeted by Israeli warplanes, killing a pediatrician and a laboratory technician, as well as their families.

He said a third member of staff, who was working as a maintenance technician, was targeted and killed as he rushed to the site of the first impact.

Two of the hospital’s paramedics were 500 meters (1,640 feet) from the hospital when they were targeted and killed by another strike, the statement continued, leaving their bodies in the street unreachable.

The Israeli army said on Friday morning that it was “not aware of any strikes in the area of ​​Kamal Adwan Hospital” and was investigating reports that staff had been killed.

Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya has been under a tightening Israeli blockade imposed on parts of northern Gaza since October, when the military said it launched an offensive to prevent Hamas from regrouping there.

The United Nations said the area was under “almost total siege” as the Israeli army restricted the access of humanitarian aid supplies to an area where about 10,000 to 15,000 people remain.

In recent days, hospital administrators have issued desperate pleas to be protected, as they say the facility is regularly targeted by Israeli shelling and explosives.

Oxfam said attempts by aid agencies to get supplies to the area since October had been unsuccessful due to “deliberate delays and systematic obstruction” by the Israeli army.