Media reports say that the Hamas-run health ministry noted on Friday that the Palestinian death toll from ongoing Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip has risen to 28,775 with 68,552 others wounded, the Hamas-run health ministry said on Friday.
The ministry said in a press statement on February 16 that the Israeli army killed 112 Palestinians and wounded 157 others during the past 24 hours.
China’s state-run news agency Xinhua reports that Palestinian medical sources told it that at least 11 Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes on Rafah, Gaza's southernmost city.
Meanwhile, Al Jazeera reports that the Hamas-run health ministry announced the death of five Palestinian patients due to the cut of oxygen and the power outage at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, south of the Gaza Strip, after it was stormed by the Israeli army.
Al Jazeera notes that Dr. James Smith, an emergency room physician who previously worked in Gaza hospitals, calls what Israel’s military is doing at Nasser Hospital “another egregious attack” on a medical facility protected by international rules of war.
He reportedly noted there’s been about 400 attacks on health centers since the war began in October.
A ruling last month from the International Court of Justice that Israel must do all it can to prevent genocide in Gaza also means the international community must do more to halt Israel’s war crimes, Dr. Smith said.
“That places immediate moral, political and legal obligations on all world powers, particularly those that up until this moment continue to finance and provide diplomatic support for the Israeli state.”
The United Nations human rights office has said that it is “deeply worried” about the Israeli raid carried out on Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza.
The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees has shared footage showing the destruction in Gaza City caused by Israel’s war against Hamas.
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) said in a social media post featuring the video that more than 70 percent of civilian infrastructure has been destroyed or severely damaged in the city.
António Guterres, United Nations Secretary-General, has condemned the Israeli military raid on a Khan Younis hospital, UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric told reporters on February 15.
"We reiterate once again that hospitals must be kept free of combat, must not be subject to any sort of military action, any type of military action on a hospital must be condemned," Dujarric said.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) raided Nasser Hospital in Gaza on February 15 and said it detained several suspects.
