Geneva — The head of the UN's World Health Organization called on Monday for the immediate release of Hossam Abu Safieh, the director of the war-torn Kamal Advan Hospital in the Gaza Strip, who is in hospital detained by the Israeli military after a major raid on the facility. The attack on Kamal Advan in Beit Lahia on Friday-Saturday left the last major medical facility in northern Gaza out of service and without patients, the WHO said.
“Hospitals in Gaza have once again become a battleground and the health care system is under serious threat“, said WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X. “The Kamal Advan Hospital in northern Gaza is closed after a raid, the forced evacuation of patients and staff, and the detention of its director. His location is unknown. We call for his immediate release.”
The Israeli military said on Sunday that its forces had killed about 20 Palestinian militants and detained “240 terrorists” in the raid, calling it one of the “largest operations” carried out in the territory. The Israeli military said it detained Abu Safiye, suspecting him of being a Hamas militant. The military did not immediately comment on the question of whether he was transferred to Israeli territory for further questioning.
Israeli officials have consistently accused Hamas of using civilians as human shields, placing its weapons and fighters in and under hospitals, schools and other vital infrastructure. The group, long recognized as a terrorist organization by Israel and the United States, denies the allegations.
Tedros said patients in critical condition at Kamal Adwan were transferred to an Indonesian hospital, also in northern Gaza, “which itself is not functioning”.
“Amid ongoing chaos in northern Gaza, WHO and partners today delivered essential medical and hygiene supplies, food and water to an Indonesian hospital and transferred 10 critical patients to Al Shifa Hospital,” he said. “We call on Israel to ensure their health care needs and rights.”
He said seven patients, along with 15 caregivers and health workers, remain in a “severely damaged” Indonesian hospital “which is unable to provide care.”
“Al Ahli Hospital and Al Wafa Rehabilitation Hospital in Gaza City also faced attacks today and both were damaged,” Tedros added. “We repeat: stop attacks on hospitals. People in Gaza need access to medical care. Humanitarians need access to provide medical care.”
A London charity Amnesty International also called on Israel immediately and unconditionally release Abu Safiyeh, saying in a series of social media posts that the hospital director had become “the voice of Gaza's destroyed health sector.”
Charity accused The Israeli military is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza – a charge Israel has repeatedly and vehemently denied – and he accused the Israeli military of detaining “hundreds of Palestinian medical workers” without charge and subjecting them to “torture and other ill-treatment”.
Since October 6 this year, Israeli operations in the Gaza Strip have been concentrated in the north, and officials say their ground and air offensive is aimed at preventing Hamas from regrouping.
Health officials in the Hamas-ruled Palestinian territory said Monday that the total death toll in Gaza from the Israeli offensive had risen to 45,541, including 27 people the health ministry said were killed in the past 24 hours alone.
The ministry said at least 108,338 people have been wounded since Israel launched its offensive against Hamas. The war was launched in response to a terrorist attack by Hamas on October 7, 2023, in which the militants killed around 1,200 people in Israel and kidnapped 251 people.
Khalil Ramzi Alkahlut / Anadolu / Getty
Cold winter temperatures have worsened the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza after more than a year of war. Doctors in the enclave have reported deaths of babies from hypothermia in recent weeks.
Dr. Fida Al-Nadi, a doctor at Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis, which has been out of full operation since Israeli raids earlier this year, told CBS News last week that one or two cases of hypothermia are reported each time. day, and that the youngest patients were most vulnerable.
“With the stressful environment we live in, many babies are born prematurely and this predisposes them to hypothermia,” Al-Nadi said.