Footage of the deadly blast at al-Ahli al-Arabi Hospital shocked the world on Tuesday. [Picture: AAP / Abed Khaled/AP]
It’s been nearly two weeks since Benjamin Netanyahu, the bloodthirsty prime minister of occupying Israel, launched an assault on Gaza. The apartheid regime cut off water, electricity and aid, all the while pummelling the enclave and killing nearly three thousand. As if that wasn’t enough, it was time to blast a hospital.
On Tuesday, a horrific blast blew apart the al-Ahli al-Arabi Baptist Hospital. This increased the death toll by Israeli airstrikes, from 2778 before the blast, to well over 3000. According to the Palestinian health ministry, at least 500 people were killed in the attack.
SMread: Dr Allan Boesak rejects street name change: legacy not worth Palestinian lives
Humanitarian crisis and outrage
Israel and Hamas have been locked in a deadly battle since Hamas, a resistance movement, launched Operation Al Aqsa Flood on 7 October. This was the strongest show of force from the resistance in five decades.
The attack on the hospital, already treating wounded patients and housing displaced civilians, could not have come at a worse time for Gazans. The director of al-Ahli hospital, Mohammed Abu Selmia, said some 350 casualties were rushed to al-Shifa hospital. But the situation there, he warned, was dire.
“We need equipment, we need medicine, we need beds, we need anaesthesia, we need everything,” he said. Furthermore, the hospital anticipated it would run out of fuel to run its generators within hours.
The latest incident prompted thousands of demonstrators to take to the streets in several Middle Eastern cities. There have been protests in Beirut, Lebanon; Amman, Jordan; and Tehran, Iran. Protestors also gathered in Ramallah, Palestine and Ankara, Turkiye.
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan condemned the blast as “the latest example of Israeli attacks devoid of the most basic human values”.
For now, Israel has attempted to shift the blame to the Palestinians. It accused Islamic Jihad of carrying out the attack, a claim the group denies.
