Nurses recalled the horrors of the Israeli attack and interrogations, claiming that troops beat and humiliated patients when they refused to leave.
An Indonesian hospital, one of northern Gaza’s largest health facilities, was so badly damaged in Israeli attacks that it will never reopen.
On Saturday, Munir al-Bursh, director general of the Ministry of Health in Gaza, told Al Jazeera, „We are shocked and horrified by the scenes left behind by Israeli forces in an Indonesian hospital.”
Israeli tanks and snipers surrounded a hospital in Beit Lahia, targeting its main generator in a raid early Friday, shortly before a four-day ceasefire between Israel and Hamas took effect.
The ministry said on Friday that the hospital was under „heavy shelling” by the Israeli army and feared for the lives of 200 injured people and medical staff. It added that a woman was killed and at least three others wounded in heavy Israeli fire.
Now in ruins, the hospital is overflowing with many wounded amid severe shortages of medical supplies. „The corridors have become wards and surgeons are operating on the floor,” said Al Jazeera’s Osama Bin Jawaid, who gained access to the facility.
“Outside the hospital building, the stench of death forces people to cover their noses as burnt and rotting bodies, among them children, pile up in corners. Burials were not carried out for days because Israeli snipers targeted anyone who dared to dig the grave,” he said.
Reporting from the hospital after the raid, Anas al-Sharif, one of the few remaining journalists in northern Gaza, said, “The occupation forces have damaged and destroyed large parts of the hospital. There has been great destruction here. Equipment and supplies have also been destroyed by the occupying forces.
A nurse who recalled the horror of the Israeli attack and interrogation of hospital staff told Al Jazeera, „When they attacked the hospital we told them we were nurses, civilians, we had children and sick people.”
“They interrogated me and three other nurses. They asked me about the resistance and whether there were any militants here. They inquired about the entrances and exits of the hospital. We all panicked. We were very scared,” he added.
Another nurse recalled that Israeli forces targeted the facility’s fourth floor with missiles, cutting off electricity and solar power to the buildings.
“We have 25 people with broken hip bones, unable to move them. They blew up this entrance and shot dead the patients inside. They searched us one by one and scanned everyone’s faces. I told them I am a nurse,” a male nurse from the emergency department told Al Jazeera.
„They took me to this corner and beat me and asked me a lot of questions about the hospital, the Israeli prisoners and the hostages – if I knew anything about them. Each question was accompanied by a room.
“After they left, we could have gone, but I promised that I would never leave my patients alone and that I would be the last person to leave this hospital,” said the nurse.
Hundreds of displaced people had earlier sought shelter at a hospital near the Jabaliya refugee camp.
The facility has been out of service for several weeks and the damage is so severe, it is unclear if it will reopen.