The Palestinian Red Crescent expressed strong concern today over Israeli strikes on an area where its hospital is located in the northern part of the Gaza Strip, where displaced people have taken shelter from shelling.

“Continuous artillery and airstrikes are underway in the Tell al-Hawa area where Al-Quds Hospital is located,” the care and aid organization said via X (formerly Twitter).

“The building is shaking and the displaced civilians and working groups are gripped by fear and panic,” he added.

The Red Crescent had announced that the area was also bombed on Sunday night.

The director of the hospital told AFP that he had been ordered by the Israeli army to evacuate.

The head of the World Health Organization described this order as “deeply worrying”, judging that it would be impossible to evacuate a hospital without endangering the lives of its patients.

“We repeat that it is impossible to evacuate a hospital full of patients without endangering their lives,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus emphasized via X.

In addition to patients, the hospital complex has hosted some 14,000 people who went there to escape the relentless Israeli shelling, according to the Red Crescent.

Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of using hospitals in the Gaza Strip to hide weapons and fighters. The Palestinian Islamist movement categorically denies this.