Hundreds of people were killed and injured in an attack on a hospital in the northern end of Gaza on Tuesday, according to World Health Organization officials.
Beyond this vague assessment, however, there is little agreement.Palestinian officials separately said it was an Israeli airstrike; Israel Defense Forces said The intelligence traced the attack to a failed Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket.
WHO officials told an emergency press conference late on Tuesday that preliminary estimates of the death toll at Ahli Arab Hospital were between 200 and 800, with the number of injured estimated to be in the hundreds. An official said the hospital was still operating at the time of the attack and “patients, medical staff and internally displaced persons were sheltering there”.
Dr. Richard Pieperkorn, the World Health Organization’s representative in the region, said the scale of the attack was “unprecedented.”
Dr. Michael Ryan, Executive Director of WHO Health Emergencies, said on behalf of WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus that WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus flew back to Geneva from Asia at a press conference on Tuesday.
However, Ryan said Dr Tedros had been fully briefed and “had expressed his shock and condemnation”, adding that the director-general was expected to comment on the attack in Geneva the next day.
Asked whether the attack amounted to a war crime, Ryan said international humanitarian law “calls for the protection of civilians and, in particular, the protection of medical facilities and medical personnel.”
He said the WHO does not conduct criminal investigations and cannot declare war crimes. “What we can say is that any attack on health care – in this case any attack on health workers – violates international law. WHO cannot establish causation.”
He later described the attack as brutal.
Ahli Arab Hospital is one of 22 hospitals in the northern end of the Gaza corridor facing evacuation orders from the Israeli military. The World Health Organization and other agencies said the order was impossible to enforce because of the insecurity in the area. Factors include the condition of many patients, the lack of ambulances and the lack of alternative accommodation. WHO officials said the hospitals were treating more than 2,000 patients in total, with many more civilians taking shelter in and around the hospitals, hoping to be protected from attacks.
The World Health Organization reiterated in a statement to the media on Tuesday that Israel’s order to withdraw from northern Gaza must be revoked.
The attack on Ahli Arab Hospital was one of more than 100 attacks on medical facilities since the war between Israel and Hamas began a week and a half ago. According to World Health Organization officials, 51 incidents have occurred in Gaza and the remainder in the nearby West Bank.
More than 2,800 people have died in Gaza since last week and nearly 11,000 have been injured, Pieperkorn told a news conference with members of the WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean office earlier on Tuesday.
He added that 61 people had been killed and 1,250 injured in the West Bank.
Rafah crossing remains closed
World Health Organization officials said late Tuesday that the Rafah crossing – the only point of entry on Gaza’s border with Egypt – remained open.
“I would like to make a request: What Gaza needs now is immediate access,” Pieperkorn said. “Rafa needs to open as soon as possible.”
Gaza’s hospitals only have about a week’s supply of blood left, he added.
As for why the crossing has not yet opened a week after all parties said it would, Dr. Richard Brennan, regional emergencies director for the WHO Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean, said the situation involves “many different dynamics.”
“Frankly, there’s a lot of finger-pointing, a lot of diplomacy,” Brennan said. He added that U.N. officials would arrive in Cairo soon and he hoped they would be able to negotiate on the open issues.
Dr Tedros said Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi agreed last week to facilitate the movement of medical supplies through the Rafah crossing. But the smooth passage of supplies will require cooperation from both Egypt and Israel, as well as additional cooperation from Hamas.
World Health Organization officials said earlier on Tuesday that if the crossing did open, Egyptian Red Crescent officials would ensure medical supplies came in first.
They added that while the World Health Organization could set up field hospitals near the Egyptian border, Egypt has not asked for this and may build field hospitals itself.
Brennan said air transport has been discussed but would require “the same type of permission as transit.”
“At this stage it is in the hands of diplomats and policymakers,” he added. “When they give us the green light, we’ll be ready.”
Ryan said that while airdrops can save lives, the amount of aid delivered by plane is far less than the amount of aid delivered by ground.
He added that even if the crossings were open, “the conditions within Gaza for the safe delivery of aid are not currently in place” as fighting continues. “The bombing must stop before this can be allowed.”
World Health Organization officials said on Tuesday that as diplomats and politicians haggled and negotiated, the clock was ticking and lives were being lost every minute.
“This needs to happen now, it needs to happen tonight,” Ryan said. “Not tomorrow morning. This simply can’t wait.”
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