Israel has detained the director of one of Gaza’s last functioning hospitals, Gaza’s Health ministry said Saturday after Israeli forces “forcibly” removed patients and staff, and fires burned across the hospital.
“The occupation forces arrested Dr. Hussam Abu Safia, Director of Kamal Adwan Hospital,” the ministry said in a statement.
Fighting has raged in the areas around Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahia for nearly three months, and on Friday, Israeli forces stormed the hospital, the ministry said, forcing patients and staff to leave the hospital and arresting dozens as military vehicles surrounded the area.
Israel’s foreign ministry said on X the hospital was a Hamas stronghold and that it facilitated the “secure evacuation” of civilians away from the hospital before launching its operation.
Gaza’s health ministry said fire had spread to several departments of the hospital.
NBC News’ crew in Gaza captured a blaze tearing through several units on Friday, with volunteers attempting to douse the flames with buckets of water, or sifting through smoldering rubble.
Israeli military spokesperson Nadav Shoshani said on X that there was no connection between the fire and IDF’s activity, adding that a “small fire” broke out while IDF troops were not in the hospital.
Nurses rushed to treat the injured in a wing of the hospital unaffected by fire while in another section, the crew witnessed the moment a boy on a gurney was pronounced dead.
One woman, sitting next to several shrouded bodies stacked on the hospital floor told the NBC News crew the names of some of the dead: “Ehassan is 7 years old, Dinaa she is 10 years old, and Mohamed is 12 years old.”
“What have the children done? Why are you silent?” she said, and pleaded to Allah, “reward us for our affliction and replace it with something better.”
“Every day, we say farewell to roses; every day, we say farewell to grooms,” she said, referring to the Gaza’s youth killed in the war.
As the temperature plummeted outside, the ministry said patients and those injured in the attack were taken to the Indonesian hospital, which was already destroyed and out of service before the patients arrived.
“They are in a very miserable and difficult situation, with no water, no electricity, no blankets, no food, and no supplies,” the Health Ministry said.
In a video geolocated by NBC News to the area around the hospital, two dozen men, stripped down to minimal clothing could be seen walking in a line with their hands raised on Friday.
Flanked by Israeli tanks, the men carried some belongings. The surrounding buildings were in ruins.
It is unclear if the men were members of the hospital staff.
A video posted to Abu Safia’s social media account and verified by NBC News showed a quadcopter dropping a bomb a few yards from the hospital. The bomb exploded with a loud bang, sending plumes of smoke into the air.
Israeli forces have killed more than 45,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials and destroyed much of Gaza’s infrastructure, including its healthcare system, since Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas terror attacks killed 1,200 people in Israel and took some 250 people hostage, according to Israeli officials.
With the destruction of Kamal Adwan, the Palestinian Health ministry noted that all three public hospitals in northern Gaza, including the Beit Hanoun Hospital and the Indonesian Hospital, are now out of service.
The attack on the hospital and the removals followed a strike on a building opposite to the hospital on Thursday, which killed nearly 50 people, including five medical staff, according to the health ministry.
The Israel Defense Forces in a statement to NBC News said it was targeting the hospital after receiving intel about the “presence of terrorist infrastructure and operatives carrying out terror activities” inside. It did not provide evidence.
Israeli attacks on Kamal Adwan in the past weeks have killed several medics and patients. An independent United Nations commission in October accused Israel of war crimes and perpetrating a “concerted policy to destroy Gaza’s healthcare system.”
Shortly after the assault on Friday, Gaza’s health ministry said contact with Abu Safia had been “cut off.”
It said separately that nearly 350 people from the hospital had been detained by Israeli forces, including 180 medical personnel and 75 injured patients and their family members.
