A World Health Organization (WHO) team that visited Al Shifa hospital in the northern part of the Gaza Strip yesterday, which has been hit by Israeli bombardment, described its emergency department as a “bloodbath”, noting that the same the hospital, which was the largest in the Palestinian enclave, now needs “revival”.

A team from the WHO and other UN agencies was able to deliver yesterday, Saturday, medical and pharmaceutical materials to the hospital, where “tens of thousands of displaced people” have taken refuge in the hospital compound, the WHO underlines in a statement issued today, in which it clarifies that “there is lack’ of drinking water and food.

“The team (that went to the hospital) described the emergency department as a ‘bloodbath’, with hundreds of injured patients inside and new patients arriving every minute,” the WHO reports, adding that “patients suffering from their injuries are stitched to the ground and that the means of dealing with pain are very limited or even non-existent.’

The hospital is now operating only minimally and with a very limited team, and “critically ill patients are transferred to Ahli Arab Hospital for surgery.”

The operating theaters are no longer functioning due to lack of oxygen and, according to the WHO team’s description, the hospital itself is “in need of resuscitation”. Only 30 patients can undergo dialysis.

The entire health infrastructure of the Gaza Strip has been severely affected by the shelling and ground operations carried out by the Israeli army following the unprecedented attack by Hamas on Israeli soil on 7 October. This attack claimed the lives of around 1,200 people, most of them civilians, while 240 hostages were taken by the Islamist Palestinian movement in the Gaza Strip.

Since then the Israeli military has been relentlessly shelling the densely populated Palestinian enclave, killing, according to the Hamas government, around 18,800 people since the war broke out, most of them civilians.

Israel accuses Hamas of using some hospitals – which enjoy special protection under the law of war – to hide weapons there, or to install underground command centers there.

The WHO said it was ready to reinforce Al Shifa “in the coming weeks” so that it can once again carry out its basic functions.

“Up to 20 hospital operating rooms, as well as post-operative care services, can function if they are regularly supplied with fuel, oxygen, medicines, food and water,” the WHO underlined, also noting that there is also a need for staff.

Today, Ahli Arab is the only “partially functioning” hospital in the entire northern part of the Gaza Strip, while three hospital infrastructures are only minimally functional: Al Shifa, Al Awda and Al Sahaba. Before the war there were 24.

The WHO also expressed concern regarding the Camal Antoine hospital. Hamas’ health ministry announced on December 13 that the Israeli army had opened fire on patient wards and denounced its “siege” that lasted several days, citing arrests of staff members.

Yesterday the Israeli army announced that it had found weapons and arrested nearly 80 members of Hamas in the area where the hospital is located in the northern part of the Gaza Strip, clarifying that the medical staff were “examined”.