By Anadolu Staff
Türkiye has evacuated over 1,300 Turkish and Turkish Cypriot nationals with their relatives from Gaza since the beginning of the Israeli attack, the country’s Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.
Ministry spokesman Oncu Keceli told reporters in the capital Ankara that Türkiye evacuated 1,359 Turkish and Turkish Cypriot nationals with their relatives from Gaza and efforts are continuing to evacuate 1,097 others.
“Not all of them are our citizens,” Keceli said, adding that the evacuation process has been followed in coordination with local authorities.
Emphasizing that the Turkish Health Ministry has evacuated patients from Gaza, he said Gazan patients and their companions were brought to Türkiye via Egypt.
As of Wednesday morning, 380 injured people and 344 companions were brought to Türkiye, he added.
A field hospital was requested to be established in Gaza, he said, adding that a delegation went to Gaza and conducted research in the field.
Underlining the importance of transferring the necessary equipment for the field hospital, he said the final stage is about to be reached.
Since the cross-border incursion by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7, the Israeli offensive into Gaza has killed more than 28,500 people and caused mass destruction and shortages of necessities.
The Israeli war on Gaza has pushed 85% of the territory's population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.
Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, which in an interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.
*Writing by Gozde Bayar