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Israeli forces on Friday attacked Kamal Adwan Hospital, one of three medical facilities in the far north of Gaza, ordering dozens of patients and hundreds of others to evacuate and leaving part of the site in flames, Health Ministry officials said.
Elsewhere in Gaza, Israeli strikes killed at least 25 people, including 15 in a single house in Gaza City, medics and the civil emergency service said.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said it had lost contact with staff at the Beit Lahiya hospital, which has been under heavy pressure from Israeli forces for weeks.
“The occupying forces are now inside the hospital and are burning it,” ministry director Munir Al-Bursh said in a statement.
The Israeli military said it had tried to limit damage to civilians and had “facilitated the safe evacuation of civilians, patients and medical personnel before the operation”, but gave no details.
In a statement, he said fighters from Hamas, which previously controlled the Gaza Strip, had operated from the hospital during the current war and had turned the site into a key stronghold.
Youssef Abu El-Rish, the Hamas-appointed deputy health minister, said Israeli forces had set fire to the surgical department, the laboratory and a warehouse.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said there was a small fire in a vacant building inside the hospital that was under control. “Regarding the claims that the fire was caused by IDF gunfire, the IDF is currently unaware of any such incident,” he said.
Like the Indonesian and Al-Awda hospitals, Kamal Adwan has been repeatedly attacked by Israeli forces, which have been pounding the northern border of the Gaza Strip for weeks, according to Palestinian medical staff.
Hundreds ordered out of hospital in northern Gaza
Bursh, the ministry director, said the army had ordered 350 people to leave Kamal Adwan for a nearby school housing displaced families. They included 75 patients, their companions and 185 medical staff.
Abu El-Rish said soldiers were moving patients and medical staff to the Indonesian Hospital, which had already been out of commission due to severe damage and had been evacuated by Israeli forces a day earlier.
Images circulating in Palestinian and Arab media, which Reuters could not immediately verify, showed smoke rising from Kamal Adwan’s area.
Much of the area around the northern towns of Jabalia, Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya has been cleared of people and leveled, fueling speculation that Israel intends to keep the area as a closed buffer zone after to end the fighting in Gaza.
Israel says its campaign is to prevent Hamas militants from regrouping, but that it will maintain full security control of Gaza after the war.
On Thursday, health officials said five medical personnel, including a pediatrician, had been killed by Israeli fire at Kamal Adwan. The Israeli military said it was not aware of a strike at the hospital and would look into the report of the doctors’ deaths.
In a statement, Hamas blamed Israel and the United States for the fate of the hospital occupants.
Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza has killed more than 45,300 Palestinians, according to health officials in the enclave. Most of the population of 2.3 million have been displaced and much of Gaza is in ruins.
The war was sparked by a Hamas-led attack in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 were taken to Gaza as hostages, according to Israeli records.
