Gaza, war for hospitals

2023-11-19 09:46:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

36 hospitals exist in the Gaza Strip, but according to UN data, two-thirds of them are no longer operational. The rest of the clinics are overcrowded, with dramatic scenes: Next to each other are pregnant in the last months and cancer patients next to the seriously injured and traumatized. Many of the injured are children and young people. If electricity comes, it only comes for a few hours. Many of the injured are children and young people, operations must be done under the light of a mobile phone.

Thousands have been injured, according to Doctors Without Borders, many are in critical condition. Added to this are tens of thousands of others, not injured, who seek protection somewhere in hospitals. To ease the emergency, France and Italy have sent navy warships with integrated hospitals and operating theaters off the coast of Gaza.

Why are hospitals so important?

Almost 7 weeks have passed since the militant-Islamist Hamas, which is categorized as a terrorist organization by the USA, EU, Germany and other countries, attacked Israel, killed 1200 people and took 240 hostages with them. Israel initially retaliated with airstrikes, three weeks ago it started a ground offensive. At this point, the clinics in the north of Gaza have increasingly become the focus of the fighting. They are the only hope for many wounded and injured, and one of the few places of protection for that part of the population that has not left the southern Gaza Strip. But according to Israeli data, they are also command centers, weapons warehouses and underground bunkers of Hamas. For this reason, hospitals have become targets of attack as never before in history. Even before, hospitals have been attacked, for example in Syria, destroyed by the civil war. But for hospitals to be deliberately used as protective shields by a warring party, and thus become a target of war, is a new dimension not previously known.

Which clinics are attacked?

The fighting in the north of Gaza was concentrated especially in four clinics: At the Al-Shifa Hospital, which is the largest clinic in the Gaza Strip, 2300 people were recently gathered. (E.act.) The Israeli army, according to its data, enables the evacuation of patients in Al-Shifa, Israel has previously expressed doubts that a Hamas command center was located under the clinic and accuses it of abusing civilians "as human shields ". The Israeli army announced that it discovered an "operational headquarters" of Hamas in the clinic and found weapons. The Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health denied this.

Rantisi Hospital is not far away. The Israeli army penetrated there on Monday. According to her data, an abandoned Hamas commando was located there, but "data" was collected that proves that some of the kidnapped hostages were kept there. The clinic is no longer in operation, the army stated that the last patients have been sent to a "safe hospital". The director of the clinic, Mohamed Sakut, spoke of a forced evacuation of the children's hospital, where the patients were left without "care on the street".

The other Al Quds Hospital is further south and has 100 beds. According to the UN, up to 14,000 people were sheltered in the territory of the hospital as refugees who had fled the fighting. Last Sunday, according to the report of the "Palestinian Red Half", this hospital had to stop working because the reserves of fuel, water and food were exhausted. The people staying there were evacuated to the south. According to Israeli data, 21 Palestinian militants were killed in the fighting in this hospital.

The 11-bed Indonesian hospital has been funded since 2015 by Jakarta and is located in Jabaliya, the largest refugee settlement in the Gaza Strip. Israeli bombardment, according to Hamas, has killed at least 30 people in the clinic. Here, too, Israel suspects a Hamas command center, which is denied by the latter. A Hamas rocket launch pad seems to have been found near the clinic.

What does international law say?

In principle, hospitals, like schools, houses of God, or water supply enjoy a special protection according to international law. In war, as in normal life, they are not attacked. But further international law underlines, that "civilian objects [...] should not be misused to support military actions". In such a case these objects lose their special protected status. If Hamas as a terrorist organization does indeed misuse units such as "human shields" for its commandos, this constitutes a violation of international law.

If a hospital is used militarily, an attack by Israel is covered by international law, but with clear conditions. "Even in such a case, this does not relieve Israel of the obligation to protect civilians," declared Marc Weller, professor of international law at the University of Cambridge. "They are not voluntary human shields, who give themselves to this risk and remain civilians who do not lose their status for protection." According to the expert, "Israel's use of force should be targeted against Hamas and its fighters."

The army of the rule of law against terrorists

The Israeli army is thus in a very difficult balancing situation. On the other hand, the situation needs to be clarified, Christoph Safferling from the University of Erlangen told ARD: "The Israeli army is a democratic army of a legal state, which tries to respect international humanitarian law and trains its soldiers accordingly. The adversary is Hamas, a terrorist organization, that ignores international law and here clearly, as far as we can see, commits war crimes by taking hostages and using people as shields."

So high are the moral demands that the Israeli army must place on itself. "Israel must ensure that the damage to the civilian population is not disproportionate to the military benefit that an operation brings," according to Marc Weller. "This seems to become more problematic, the longer the conflict lasts and the more civilians are disproportionately affected by the military actions of the Israeli side."/ DW