Hospitals in Gaza warn of thousands of deaths as supplies run out

Doctors in Loop They warned Sunday that thousands of people could die if hospitals full of injured people run out of fuel and basic supplies. The Palestinians in the besieged coastal enclave were trying to find food, water and a safe haven ahead of an Israeli ground offensive in the war sparked last week by a deadly Israeli attack. Hamas.

Israeli forces, backed by a growing deployment of US ships to the region, were positioned along the Gaza border and rehearsing what Israel said would be a broad campaign to dismantle the militant group. Harsh airstrikes over the past week have destroyed entire neighborhoods but have failed to stop militant rocket fire into Israel.

Gaza’s Health Ministry reported 2,670 Palestinians killed and 9,600 wounded since the fighting began, more than the 2014 war in Gaza, which lasted about six weeks. That makes the fight the deadliest of the five Gaza wars for both sides. More than 1,400 Israelis have been killed, the vast majority civilians killed in the Hamas attack on October 7.

An estimated 155 others, including children, were captured by Hamas and taken to Gaza. This is the deadliest war for Israel since the 1973 Yom Kippur War with Egypt and Syria.

The US State Department said Secretary of State Antony Blinken would return to Israel on Monday after completing a frenetic tour of six Arab countries aimed at preventing the fighting from triggering a broader regional conflict.

With the situation in Gaza increasingly desperate, the United States appointed David Satterfield, a former ambassador to Turkey who has years of experience in Middle East diplomacy, as special envoy for humanitarian affairs in the conflict. U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in a statement Sunday that Satterfield will focus on getting humanitarian assistance to Palestinians in Gaza.

Hospitals were expected to run out of fuel for generators within two days, according to the United Nations, which said that would endanger the lives of thousands of patients. Gaza’s only power plant was shut down due to lack of fuel after Israel blocked access to the 40-kilometer (25-mile) long territory following the Hamas attack.

At the Nasser Hospital in the southern town of Khan Yunis, the intensive care units were full of wounded people, most of them children under three years old. Hundreds of people with serious injuries from explosions had arrived at the hospital, where fuel was expected to run out on Monday, said Dr. Mohammed Qandeel, a critical care doctor at the center.

There are 35 patients in the ICU who depend on respirators to stay alive and another 60 on dialysis, he noted. If fuel runs out, “it means that the entire health system will shut down, services will remain disconnected”said.

“We are talking about another catastrophe, another war crime, a historical tragedy”, he said, while the children’s cry of pain could be heard in the background. “All of these patients are in danger of dying if the power goes out,” she said.

At Kamal Alwan Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip, Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, director of pediatrics, said they had not evacuated despite the Israeli order because there was no way to transfer patients without putting their lives in danger. . There were seven newborns in the ICU on ventilators, he said. “We cannot evacuate, it would mean their death and that of other patients in our care.”

In addition, patients continued to arrive with severed limbs, severe burns, and other life-threatening injuries. “It’s scary,” said.

The Shifa hospital in Gaza City, the largest in the territory, said it would bury 100 bodies in a mass grave as an emergency measure because its morgue was overflowing and families could not bury their loved ones. Tens of thousands of people have gathered at the hospital complex seeking shelter.

“An unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding before our eyes”said Philippe Lazzarini, director of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

Gaza was already experiencing a humanitarian crisis due to the growing shortage of water and medical supplies caused by the Israeli blockade. Some bakeries closed and people said they couldn’t buy bread. Israel has also cut off water, forcing many to resort to brackish wells.

US national security adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN that Israeli authorities informed him that they had restored water service to the southern Gaza Strip. Israel’s energy and water minister, Israel Katz, said in a statement that water had been restored “at a specific point” in Gaza, but did not give details. Aid groups in Gaza say they have seen no evidence that water supplies have been restored.

Israel dropped leaflets on Gaza City in the north and reiterated its warnings on social media to order more than a million Gazans — nearly half the population — to go south. The army said it was trying to ward off civilians ahead of a major campaign against Hamas militants in the north, where they have extensive networks of tunnels and bunkers.

Hamas urged people to stay home, and the Israeli military released photographs it said showed a Hamas roadblock preventing southbound traffic.

Despite that, more than 600,000 people have evacuated Gaza City, said Israel’s main military spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari.

The United Nations and humanitarian groups said the mass exodus in Gaza, along with the Israeli siege of the territory, would cause untold human suffering. The World Health Organization said the evacuation “could amount to a death sentence” for the more than 2,000 patients in northern hospitals.

Some 500,000 people, nearly a quarter of Gaza’s population, were sheltering in United Nations schools and other facilities across the territory, where water supplies were dwindling, said Juliette Touma, spokeswoman for the UN refugee agency. UN. “Gaza is drying up”he added.

The army said on Sunday that it would not attack any routes to the south from 10:00 am to 1 pm and again urged Palestinians to leave the north.

The United States is trying to negotiate the reopening of the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt to allow Americans and other foreigners to leave and humanitarian aid accumulated on the Egyptian side to enter the territory. The crossing, which closed due to air raids at the start of the war, has not reopened for the moment.

Israel has said the siege will only be lifted with the return of the captives.

Hundreds of relatives of the approximately 150 people captured by Hamas in Israel and transferred to Gaza gathered outside the Israeli Ministry of Defense in Tel Aviv to demand their release.

“This is my cry to the world: please help bring my family, my wife and three children,” said Avihai Brodtz of Kfar Azza. Many expressed discontent with the government and said they had no information about their loved ones.

Hamas rocket attacks on Israel continued on Sunday, prompting a broader evacuation of the southern Israeli city of Sderot. The city of about 34,000 is located about 1.6 kilometers (a mile) from Gaza and has been a frequent target of rockets. “The children are traumatized, they can’t sleep at night,” Yossi Edri told Channel 13 before boarding a bus.

The military said on Sunday that an airstrike in southern Gaza had killed a Hamas commander blamed for the killings in Nirim, one of the towns Hamas attacked in southern Israel. Israel said it hit 100 military targets overnight, including command centers and rocket launchers.

In the north, Hezbollah fighters fired rockets and an anti-tank missile and Israel responded with airstrikes and artillery fire, according to the military. Israel also reported a shooting attack on one of its border posts. The violence killed at least one person on the Israeli side and left several injured on both sides. Israel later closed access to areas up to 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) from the border and ordered civilians within two kilometers to shelter in safe spaces.

A Hezbollah spokeswoman, Rana Sahili, said the attacks represent “an advert” and that does not mean that Hezbollah has decided to enter the war.

Israel and Hezbollah, who fought a devastating war in 2006, have exchanged fire along the border on several occasions since the start of the new war in Gaza.

Israel has mobilized some 360,000 reservists and built up troops and tanks along the border with Gaza. Militants in Gaza have fired 5,500 rockets since the fighting began, many of which have reached the heart of Israel, as Israeli planes pounded Gaza.

Israeli officials said the goal of their Gaza offensive was to destroy Hamas.

“If Hamas thought we would fall apart, then no: we will tear Hamas apart,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the start of Israel’s cabinet meeting on Sunday.

Israeli officials gave no timetable for a ground invasion.

In a televised address Saturday night, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, the army’s chief spokesman, said: “We are soon going to attack Gaza City very widely”without specifying the moment of the attack.

Asked at a news conference whether Israel would treat civilians left in the north as combatants, Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, another military spokesman, said: “That is why we have urged people who are not related to Hamas to move south.”

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said late Saturday that the United States would send a second aircraft carrier strike group, the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, to the eastern Mediterranean. It was a show of force to dissuade Hamas allies, such as Iran or the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, from seeking an expansion of the war.

For his part, US Secretary Blinken met in Riyadh with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, as part of the Biden administration’s efforts to prevent a broader regional conflict. Prince Mohammed was the sixth Arab leader Blinken has met with since his arrival in the Middle East on Thursday.

Hamas remained defiant. In a televised speech on Saturday, Ismail Haniyeh, a leader of the group, stated that “all the massacres” would not break the Palestinian people.

Hamas spokesman Jihad Taha told The Associated Press in Beirut that Israel “he does not dare to fight a battle on land” for the hostages. He mentioned the possible entry into battle of Hezbollah and other regional forces if Israel undertakes a ground invasion, although he declined to say whether they had made any concrete commitments.

Source: AP