GAZA (Reuters) -The Israeli military said it was carrying out an operation against Palestinian Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip’s Al Shifa Hospital on Wednesday, urging all members of the group there to surrender.
Less than an hour earlier, around 1 a.m. local time, a Gaza health ministry spokesman said Israel had told officials in the enclave that it would raid the Shifa hospital complex “in the coming minutes.”
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said: “Based on intelligence information and an operational necessity, IDF forces are carrying out a precise and targeted operation against Hamas in a specified area in the Shifa hospital.”
The military added: “The IDF forces include medical teams and Arabic speakers, who have undergone specified training to prepare for this complex and sensitive environment, with the intent that no harm is caused to the civilians.”
Hamas has a command center underneath Al Shifa hospital, the biggest in Gaza, using the hospital and tunnels underneath to conceal military operations and hold hostages. Hamas denies it.
The U.S. said that its own intelligence supported those conclusions.
Israel has sworn to destroy Hamas in retaliation for the militants’ cross-border assault into Israel on Oct 7. Hamas killed 1,200 people in the rampage and took more than 240 hostage.
Hamas says 650 patients and 5,000 to 7,000 other civilians are trapped inside Al Shifa hospital grounds, under constant fire from Israeli snipers and drones.
Thirty-six babies are left from the neo-natal ward after three died. Without fuel for generators to power incubators, the babies were being kept as warm as possible, lined up eight to a bed.
Palestinians trapped in the hospital dug a mass grave to bury patients who died and no plan was in place to evacuate babies despite Israel announcing an offer to send portable incubators, Ashraf Al-Qidra, Gaza’s health ministry spokesman, said.
