O Al-Shifa hospital in the Gaza Strip is now an “empty shell with human graves after the latest ruling”.

The statements were made by the director general of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Ghebreyesus, who said that a WHO team “witnessed at least five dead bodies” during an expedition inside the hospital.

“Most buildings are severely destroyed and most tools damaged or reduced to ashes. Even restoration of minimal functionality in the short term seems implausible. An in-depth assessment by a team of engineers is needed to determine whether buildings are safe for use in the future,” wrote Ghebreyesus on X (formerly Twitter).

In the same message, the WHO director-general assured that the institution’s recent efforts, in collaboration with partners on the ground, to “revive basic services in Al-Shifa hospital” were “lost”. “People are, once again, deprived of access to health services.”

In conclusion, Ghebreyesus reinforces the WHO’s calls for “protection of the remaining health infrastructure in Gaza”, as well as “of humanitarian and health workers”. “More land entry points to allow access to northern Gaza” and “a functional deconfliction mechanism” are two other calls, in addition to “uninterrupted humanitarian aid access to the Gaza Strip” and a “ceasefire “.

Experts who managed to enter the building described the existence of numerous graves excavated in various areas of the hospital, discovered partially buried corpses and a strong odor of decomposing bodies.

“It is impractical to resume at least minimal hospital services in the short term; this would require enormous efforts to find and neutralize explosive devices and ensure security at the site,” the WHO stressed.

Al-Shifa Hospital, where thousands of refugees and displaced people were housed, as well as patients and medical staff, was the target of a two-week offensive and military siege by Israel in March, which left it destroyed.

Authorities in the Strip denounced “a bloody massacre”, after the Israeli army declared the death of dozens of “terrorists”, who Gaza claimed were Palestinian civilians.

According to the UN and WHO mission, which cites medical sources at the hospital, patients were kept “in terrible conditions” during the siege, and at least 20 did not survive the “cruel lack of food, water, health and hygiene”. .

The deadliest war between Israel and Hamas, which began on October 7, 2023, turns six months old on Sunday.

The conflict was triggered on October 7, 2023 with the unprecedented attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement on Israeli territory, which led Israel to retaliate, promising that it would only end the military offensive after “annihilating” Hamas.

According to the Hamas Ministry of Health, 32,500 people died and 75,000 were injured in the conflict.

[Notícia atualizada às 22h08]

Read Also: WHO director “horrified” by death of seven humanitarian workers

Source: https://www.noticiasaominuto.com/mundo/2535527/al-shifa-e-agora-concha-vazia-com-sepulturas-humanas-apos-cerco

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