Gaza’s main hospital was collapsing on Saturday as the Israeli forces surrounded it and a power outage caused the deaths of a premature baby in an incubator and at least four other patients, according to the hospital director and the Gaza health ministry.
Without fuel to run generators, the hospital, Al-Shifa, in Gaza City, has been plunged into darkness and its medical equipment has stopped working. For weeks — as Israel has cut off supplies of fuel and electricity — the hospital has relied on backup generators and a dwindling supply of fuel.
“Surgeries have had to stop,” said the hospital’s director, Dr. Mohammed Abu Salmiya. “Kidney dialysis has stopped and the neonatal unit is in a very dire situation. A baby has died because of lack of oxygen and electricity and heat.”
Over the last few days, Israel’s ground invasion of the territory has moved deeper into Gaza City, slowly closing in on the hospitals that have provided refuge for tens of thousands. Israel says the hospitals are shielding Hamas military operations in tunnels below.
At Al-Shifa, thousands of seriously ill and wounded patients and displaced people have been trapped inside while Israeli tanks and troops surround the compounds, with snipers occasionally firing off shots, according to the health ministry, doctors and some witnesses sheltering inside.
Nearby, there is intense, close-quarter combat between Israeli troops and fighters from Hamas, the armed Palestinian group that controls Gaza.
The Israeli military has repeatedly urged patients and people sheltering at hospitals in Gaza City to be evacuated to the south away from the urban combat. Four hospitals in the city were evacuated on Friday.
But some of those who tried to leave Al-Shifa on Saturday, including a family, were shot at by snipers they believed to be Israeli, and at least one person was killed, according to multiple people at Al-Shifa Hospital, including Dr. Abu Salmiya.
Admiral Hagari said on Saturday evening that the Israeli military would help transfer babies out of Al-Shifa, but the hospital director said there were no plans for that.
On Saturday, the Palestine Red Crescent warned that Al-Quds Hospital, another major hospital in Gaza City, was at risk of closing down because it was running out of fuel to power generators. The hospital has 500 patients, the Red Crescent said.
Israeli tanks and military vehicles have surrounded Al-Quds hospital and are shelling the building, the Red Crescent said.
“Everyone is on top of one another, displaced people, wounded people, even the medical staff,” he said. “They try to save this person and that person, but they can’t. There’s no electricity or medicine or anything,” he added.
“People are afraid, but we pray that God will protect us.”
