Three newborn babies have died in Gaza\u2019s largest hospital after it\u00a0went \u201cout of service\u201d amid intense fighting in the area, according to the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health, who say the facility is\u00a0under siege from Israeli forces. <\/p>\n
Doctors are now being forced to carry out artificial respiration by hand on the\u00a036\u00a0other babies they are caring for,\u00a0Al-Bursh\u00a0said. Doctors have covered the babies with soft lining and blankets as part of this effort. <\/p>\n
Ministry spokesman Dr. Ashraf al-Qidra\u00a0said he was trapped inside the\u00a0complex in northern Gaza, saying it was\u00a0\u201cout of service\u201d\u00a0after repeatedly being targeted by Israeli fire. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe intensive care unit, pediatric department, and oxygen devices have stopped working,\u201d al-Qidra\u00a0said. <\/p>\n
Medical charity Doctors Without Borders said it could not contact any of its staff at Al-Shifa Hospital who had described a \u201ccatastrophic situation\u201d inside. <\/p>\n
In a statement Saturday, the organization said \u201cambulances can no longer move to collect the injured, and non-stop bombardment prevents patients and staff from evacuating.\u201d <\/p>\n
Israel has been stepping up its offensive inside Gaza as part of its response to the surprise Hamas attacks that left 1,200 people dead. <\/p>\n
Since then, Israel has been bombarding and blockading Gaza, an already impoverished and densely packed territory, leaving more than 11,000 people dead, according to Palestinian health officials. The assault has sparked escalating warnings about healthcare in Gaza. <\/p>\n
The Director General for the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC),\u00a0Robert Mardini,\u00a0said the organization was \u201cshocked and appalled by the images and reports coming from Al-Shifa Hospital\u00a0in Gaza.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cThe unbearably desperate situation for patients & staff trapped inside must stop. Now,\u201d Mardini said in a post on X. <\/p>\n
Al-Bursh\u00a0said Al-Shifa Hospital\u00a0was under \u201ccomplete siege\u201d with staff and patients unable to evacuate. <\/p>\n
There are still more than 400 people being treated at the\u00a0hospital\u00a0and around 20,000 displaced people seeking shelter in the\u00a0hospital\u00a0complex, according to Al-Bursh. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe situation is very difficult and dire. After a slowdown in shelling this afternoon, the shelling and gun fire resumed, heavily targeting anything that moves,\u201d Sarsour said, adding that medics inside the facility were working by candlelight and that food is growing scarce for both doctors and patients. <\/p>\n
Al-Bursh\u00a0said people who had been injured were instead being transported to the Al-Ahli Hospital as Al-Shifa\u00a0was inaccessible. <\/p>\n
Humanitarian agencies have been sounding the alarm about the situation at Al-Shifa Hospital. Angelita Caredda, the Norwegian Refugee Council\u2019s Middle East director, said in a statement that the group was \u201chorrified by reports of relentless attacks on Gaza\u2019s hospitals.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cPatients, including babies,\u00a0and\u00a0civilians seeking relief are trapped under attack. It is an affront to wage war around\u00a0and\u00a0on hospitals,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Martin Griffiths, head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, also condemned the attacks, saying that \u201cthere can be no justification for acts of war in health care facilities.\u201d <\/p>\n
In a statement posted on X, Griffiths wrote that people using and working at Gazan healthcare facilities \u201cmust trust that they are places of shelter and not of war.\u201d <\/p>\n
Other hospitals have been caught up in the fighting. On Friday the director of two facilities said Israeli tanks\u00a0had them encircled. <\/p>\n\n
Three newborn babies have died in Gaza\u2019s largest hospital after it\u00a0went \u201cout of service\u201d amid intense fighting in the area, according to the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health, who say the facility is\u00a0under siege from Israeli forces. Doctors are now being forced to carry out artificial respiration by hand on the\u00a036\u00a0other babies they are caring for,\u00a0Al-Bursh\u00a0said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":11496,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11495","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11495\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}