Israel committed war crimes in Gaza hospitals, according to Human Rights Watch
The Human Rights Watch (HRW) organization accused the Israeli military forces on Thursday of causing “unnecessary” deaths and sufferings to Palestinian patients while occupying hospitals in Gaza, something that “amounts to war crimes.”
According to the last HRW report, several witnesses of three hospitals in the Strip said that the Israel military denied electricity, water, food and medicines to the patients, as well as fired civilians, abused health workers and destroyed “deliberately” medical facilities and equipment.
The organization interviewed nine patients and two health personnel members who were present when the Israeli army assaulted and occupied the Shifa hospitals between 2023 and 2024 (in Gaza City); Kamal Adwan (in Beit Lahia) and Nasser (in Jan Yunis).
In these medical complexes, where at least 84 patients died due to lack of health care – without counting the dead for bombings or shots -, Israel’s military forces interfered “seriously” in the treatment of injured and sick, the organization said. The toilets interviewed said that the army refused to carry medicines and other supplies to patients and blocked access to hospitals and ambulances, which caused the death of injured and chronic patients, including children in dialysis treatment.
According to HRW, this deprivation of food, water and other supplies by the Israeli authorities constitutes “a crime against humanity of extermination and acts of genocide.”
One of the sources cited by the organization, Ansam al-Sharif, which was hospitalized after losing a leg in an Israeli air attack and needed crutches to walk, said that she and the rest of the patients from the Nasser hospital spent four days without food, water, or medicines.
“The Israeli military occupation of the hospitals of Gaza has transformed places of healing and recovery into centers of death and abuse. Those responsible for these horrible abuses, including high controls, must account for accounts,” noted the deputy director of the rights of HRW’s child, Bill Van Esveld.
HRW also questions the forced evacuations of the hospitals ordered by the Israeli forces, who put in “serious danger” both the sick and the health personnel, since they were forced to move without assistance even if they were in a stretcher or in a wheelchair. And he denounces that the military burned or illegally destroyed some buildings of these medical complexes after the evacuations.
According to the administrators of the Shifa hospital cited by HRW, only between November 11 and 17 died 40 patients, largely due to electricity cuts.
All this without the Israeli authorities having announced an investigation into alleged serious violations of International Humanitarian Law in the Hospitals of Gaza – among which “apparent war crimes” are included – committed by Israel’s military.
HRW recalls that international humanitarian law establishes that the parties involved in a conflict must respect and protect hospitals, as well as take all possible precautions to minimize damage to patients, staff and facilities.
The HRW report takes place just a few days after Israel broke on Tuesday the high fire with Hamas with bombings that have caused the death of more than 400 Palestinians. (EFE)
