Gaza City Medical describe the hospital overwhelmed by the victims of Israeli strikes

Doctors of one of the last functional hospitals in Gaza City say they are overwhelmed by victims of Israeli strikes and must carry out operations in dirty conditions with little or no anesthetics.

An Australian medication volunteering at the Al-Shifa hospital told the BBC that every day was a mass event, while another described how a baby had been saved from the body of a pregnant woman who had been killed.

Israeli forces are only 500 m (1,640 feet) from the hospital while expanding their offensive on the ground to fully occupy the city of Gaza, which the Israeli soldiers call the “main bastion” of Hamas.

The witnesses say that the tanks were advancing in the city center in the south and northwest.

Israeli airfields and artillery, attacks by quadcopter drones and remote vehicle detonations driven on a scale of explosives continue to drive tens of thousands of Palestinians from their house every day.

The Israeli army says that it realizes the offensive in Gaza City to defeat Hamas and guarantee the release of hostages still held by the group after 23 months of war.

Warning: contains graphic descriptions of injuries

The Al-Shifa Hospital was once the largest medical complex in the Gaza Strip. It is now in ruins, marked by toilets, with pupils and burnt ball holes.

But interior doctors work beyond the full stretch. Many beds do not even have a mattress, the drugs are rare and the victims are endless.

“It’s just a mass murder, murder, torture, a nightmare,” said Dr. Nada Abu Alrub, an emergency specialist in Australia on Tuesday.

She said they operated on patients seriously injured with “minimal to almost no anesthesia”.

“No analgesic too, with their members suspended with a piece of skin and the tendon. The brain counts. The organs are out. It’s horrible,” she added.

Last week, she said, the doctors had to carry out an emergency cesarean on a nine-month pregnant woman whose head had been exploded. They managed to save her daughter.

“The baby was a bit bradycardial, so his heart rate was weak,” she recalls. “She was transferred to another hospital.”

Dr. Saya Aziz, an Australian anesthesiologist, described how a six -year -old boy with a fractured arm and leg has been waiting for three days for an operation to have placed external fixers on them because the only orthopedic surgeon of the hospital had to prioritize more serious cases.

“Every two hours, there are several cases of amputation with massive resuscitation. It is life or the member, literally,” she told the BBC.

“And you enter and you try to anesthetize them (while), they blur flies in the theater.

“There is blood on the beds. There is no equipment. There is no replacement. And you can see the pain and sadness of health workers.”

Outside the hospital, the Israeli tanks are advancing, while the offensive on the ground against Hamas in the city of Gaza continues.

A video published on social networks showed a reservoir in Hamid Junction in the Rimal district, less than 500 m from Al-Shifa.

Another video showed troops in the south, just 700 m from the city center.

Palestinian journalist Fathi Sabah, who lives in the south of Gaza but has an apartment in the southern district of Tal al-Hawa in the city, said that family members had barely escaped an Israeli incursion.

“My wife and son went to our apartment to collect personal effects. They suddenly found themselves trapped while the tanks surrounded the area,” he said.

“They lived at the hardest night of their lives before escaping through a rear door. It is incredible how fast the tanks reached the heart of the city.”

About a million Palestinians lived in Gaza City before Israel announced his plans for the offensive last month.

The UN says that more than 320,000 have fled to the south since then, while the Israeli army puts the figure at 640,000.

The Israeli army has told people to go south for their safety in a “humanitarian zone” designated in Al-Mawasi, where it said that medical care, water and food will be provided.

However, witnesses say that the Al-Rashid coastal road is seriously congestioned and that families have trouble for hours to finish the trip.

The cost of evacuation would also have climbed more than $ 3,000 (£ 2,200) per family – far beyond the scope of most residents.

The United Nations also said that the al-mawasi tent camps were overcrowded and dangerous, and that the South Hospitals several times operate their capacity.

“The tanks are only a few meters from my house, but I cannot afford the cost of the flight,” a 62 -year -old father in the Sabra district told the BBC Sultan Nassar. “Death is everywhere, in the north and south.”

Palestine Red Crescent Society said that the Al-Quds Hospital Oxygen Station in Tal Al-Hawa had stopped operating after being struck by Israeli forces, and that it had only enough oxygen cylinders pre-filled to last three days.

Israeli military vehicles were currently positioned at the southern door of the hospital, preventing anyone from entering or leaving, he added.

The Israeli army said it was examining the report.

On Monday, the Ministry of Health of Gaza, managed by Hamas, said that the Israeli advance and the bombing had forced the Al-Rrand children’s hospital and St John Eye Hospital nearby in the northern NASR district to evacuate patients and close.

The Jordanian armed forces have also decided to close their campaign hospital in Tal al-Hawa and move it to the south of Gaza, with Jordan’s state news agency pointing that bombing and other intense explosions in the surroundings had damaged the establishment and certain medical equipment.

The Primary Health Center of Palestinian Medical Retised Society in Gaza City was destroyed during an Israeli air strike that would have injured two health workers, the World Health Organization said. The center provided blood services, trauma care, cancer drugs and treatment of chronic diseases.

The Israeli army launched a campaign in Gaza in response to the attack by Hamas against southern Israel on October 7, 2023, during which around 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

At least 65,382 people have been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the Ministry of Health of the Territory.