Israeli military targets 2 hospitals with airstrikes

GAZA, Palestine (AA) - Israeli warplanes targeted the surroundings of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza with airstrikes overnight, causing casualties among displaced people and medical teams, an official said early Friday.

Ashraf Al-Qudra, the Health Ministry spokesman in Gaza, said similar strikes were conducted on hospitals in the central and northern Gaza Strip in the past few hours.

The head of Al-Rantisi Hospital in Gaza said it was targeted in a direct attack, causing a fire to break out both inside and in the facility’s surroundings.

Al-Rantisi, a specialized hospital for children, had announced Thursday that it was downsizing its operations due to a fuel shortage, limiting them to its intensive care and nursery units.

Al-Shifa Hospital, the largest medical center in the Gaza Strip, was targeted in multiple airstrikes, causing casualties.

Al-Qudra said in a statement that Israel has moved to a new stage of targeting hospitals after making many threats.

He also warned that the northern and central Gaza Strip will soon be left without any medical care facilities.

The head of Al-Shifa Hospital said that six Palestinians were killed in the Israeli attack on the vicinity of the hospital. Another attack targeted the maternity unit of the hospital, killing one Palestinian and wounding another.

Israeli airstrikes late Thursday in the vicinity of the Indonesian Hospital and Al-Awda Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip caused severe damage to the hospitals’ infrastructure and ambulances.