– Al Quds is now experiencing its worst days. The corridors of Al Quds Hospital are crowded. Many of them need life-saving help, but most are hiding from the bombs. Doctor and hospital director Bashar Mourad barely has time to talk to news. He still sat for a few minutes. Al Quds Hospital is located in the south of Gaza City. It is run by the Palestinian Red Crescent. – Right now tens of buildings are being bombed around the hospital. The number of refugees has increased significantly after the bombing last night. Now there are around sixteen thousand who have gathered around the hospital. Israeli authorities have said they will bomb the hospital and are asking civilians to evacuate. The sixteen thousand who are hiding there still think that the hospital is the safest place they can stay. Three days after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that they are in the second phase of the war, the situation in the Gaza Strip is critical. 8,306 people have been killed in Gaza since the conflict flared up again, the Hamas-controlled health authorities report. Almost 3,500 of them are children. Among the more than sixteen thousand refugees, the hospital now treats 150 people who are seriously injured, and 88 people receive intensive treatment, says Mourad. Heralds a food crisis – How do they have enough food for sixteen thousand people? – That is the big challenge we are facing now. Until yesterday, some grocery stores were open, but now they are closed. Now we sound the alarm: – We have one warehouse which is meant for 150 employees. Now we are talking about food for more than sixteen thousand refugees. There will be a food crisis! There is not only a lack of food, but also clean water. That worries the hospital director. Bashar Mourad is a doctor and director of Al Quds Hospital in Gaza. Photo: P / news – We receive fuel from private operators or donors on a daily basis. We use the diesel generators to filter impure water from our wells. If we run out of diesel, we will not have clean water: – That there is no clean water for all these refugees is the biggest disaster we can be exposed to. The Church’s emergency aid depicts a desperate situation where people drank salt water. – Not a single safe place on the Gaza Strip On Sunday, several of the hospitals in Gaza City were asked to evacuate by the Israeli authorities. Just 50 meters from the hospital, an attack was reported at the same time. – It is not possible to evacuate so many people. Seventy percent of those here are children and women, in addition to the sick and wounded. Mourad says that they have been in contact with hospitals further south, but none have the capacity to accept more. – People refuse to leave the hospital because there is not a single safe place on the Gaza Strip: – The airstrikes never end south of Gaza City. People stick to the hospital because they think it is protected. According to the Geneva Convention and international human rights, it should be. Inside the Al Quds hospital during the corona pandemic in 2020. Photo: AP The hospital is marked with flags from the Red Crescent and the Red Cross. An attack directed at health personnel who pray these symbols is a breach of international law. Since 7 October, there have been 200 attacks against health facilities in the Palestinian territories. It has claimed 494 lives, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). – These flags must be recognized by all parties. One must not attack hospitals! Mourad says that the medical need is so great that they cannot evacuate. – We provide ambulance service, emergency department and command centre. We have taken in sixteen thousand refugees, at the same time as treating those injured in the war. Every day, perhaps hundreds are transported to the hospital. Mourad says that they carry out operations and relieve public hospitals. They ask to evacuate, but block the road At the same time as the residents of Gaza try to flee, there are reports that the central vegans are closed. Mourad confirms that. According to Al Jazeera, there must have been a collision with armored vehicles on Salah al-Din Road, which is closing the road. This is mainly what binds the south and the north together on the Gaza Strip. – Today we tried to get a medical team from the south, but unfortunately we couldn’t. The road is closed. Mourad says that the Al Rasheed, one of the main rivers along the coast, has been cut off. – Our team was exposed to great danger when they moved in that area last night. They barely survived. We do not know what their situation is now. Al Quds Hospital and main roads in the Gaza Strip. Hevdar hospitals are Hamas headquarters Avi Nir-Feldklein, the Israeli ambassador to Norway, says that the war is complicated and claims that Hamas is hiding in civilian infrastructure. – Their headquarters is the Al Shifa hospital in Gaza. There is a full-scale city under there which makes it difficult for us. Every civilian life lost is tragic, and that is why we are asking you to evacuate. So good. An injured man and a child on their way to the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City. Photo: Dawood NEMER / AFP Mourad denies that hospitals are used as military bazaars by Hamas. – That is not true. There are over sixteen thousand people in the hospital. The entire hospital is open, all rooms and all offices are open. Where is the command centre?, Mourad asks in frustration and continues: – There are only injured people, refugees and children here at the hospital. There are also no military bases nearby. Some UN schools are used as accommodation for refugees, otherwise just residential areas. This is just a rumor from Israel. – If Hamas uses civilian buildings to attack Israel, then it becomes a legitimate military target, because buildings are used for military purposes, says Nir-Feldklein. – Even if the building is full of women and children? – That is why we are asking them to evacuate. We haven’t done anything with the hospitals yet, because we don’t want to harm them. They are still there.
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