Israeli military assaults on the Gaza Strip’s hospitals have ramped up in recent weeks to the highest level so far this year, bringing a health system already weakened by 19 months of war to a breaking point. NBC News has analyzed 27 videos and images from the last two months taken by civilians and our own journalists on the ground to piece together a picture of the full extent of the destruction of a health system engulfed in war.
In footage from a surveillance camera, men, women and children could be seen crossing the entrance to Khan Younis’ European Hospital moments before a missile hit, blasting people into the air as others scattered in panic. Another video, posted to social media and verified by NBC News, showed the fiery aftermath of an explosion at a medical warehouse near Al-Awda Hospital, in northern Gaza, which has been attacked repeatedly, including on May 22 and again on May 24.
“Nearly all hospitals in Gaza are now damaged or destroyed, and half of them are no longer operational,” Jens Laerke, spokesperson for the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA, told NBC News. During the war, Gaza’s hospitals have eked back services, only to be repeatedly struck or besieged again.
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Hospitals are protected under international humanitarian law, but Israel has maintained that Hamas uses hospitals and medical centers for military activities, opening them to attack. Hamas has denied doing so. Humanitarian groups, including the United Nations, have said Israel has not provided sufficient information to substantiate many of its claims and have called for independent investigations of Israel’s attacks and Hamas’ alleged misuse of the facilities.
Earlier this week, however, the Israeli military gave a small group of reporters a tour of a tunnel that was uncovered beneath the European Hospital, where it said it had recovered the body of Hamas’ military chief Mohammed Sinwar.
“We cannot stress this enough: Hospitals must never be militarized or targeted. If they are, it may constitute a war crime,” Laerke said.
Of Gaza’s 36 hospitals, none are fully functioning; 17 are providing partial services, and 19 are not functioning at all, according to World Health Organization data from Monday. The wider health system, including ambulances, field hospitals and clinics, has been attacked more than 700 times since the start of the war, killing at least 900 people and injuring more than 1,000. (The death toll across Gaza is more than 55,000, according to the health ministry.)
After a ceasefire was called in January, Israeli military attacks on Gaza’s health system had abated. The truce fell apart in March, and WHO data shows a ramping up of attacks in recent weeks. While the organization tallied five attacks on Gaza’s health system in April, after the first three weeks of May, the number of attacks had quadrupled to 21, with at least three more attacks since, including on the vicinity of a dialysis center at the Indonesian Hospital on June 1 and strikes on Al-Aqsa and Al-Ahli Hospitals on June 4 and 5. In addition, hostilities near Al-Amal Hospital have rendered it “out of service,” the WHO said Monday.
The earliest attack recorded by NBC News during that two-month period was on April 2, when an Israeli airstrike hit a UNRWA clinic in Jabalia, north of Gaza City, that was housing displaced people. Video captured by NBC News on the ground documented the chaotic aftermath: walls crushed to rubble, charred mattresses, furniture blasted into shards. A child’s small, shrouded body was loaded onto a donkey cart to be taken to the morgue.
In another case, the Israel Defense Forces struck two hospitals on the same day, May 13, both in Khan Younis. Video verified by NBC News shows several large plumes of smoke rising from the grounds of the European Hospital. Palestinian health officials said at least 16 people were killed and dozens more injured. The WHO said the facility had been forced to suspend services.
Also struck that day was the Nasser Medical Complex. Video posted by the U.N. showed scattered debris, twisted hospital beds and damaged equipment. It was the fourth time Nasser had been hit during the war, according to the U.N., with the latest strike killing two people and injuring a dozen others.
In a statement in response to those attacks, the IDF said its forces had targeted a command and control center located at Nasser Hospital and “a Hamas underground terrorist infrastructure site” underneath the European Hospital.
The IDF provided evidence of what it said was a Hamas tunnel beneath the European Hospital. It did not, however, provide evidence for the command and control center at Nasser, or for the following cases, but broadly said: “The Hamas terrorist organization continues to use hospitals in the Gaza Strip for terrorist activity.” NBC News is not able to independently verify the IDF’s statements.
The IDF confirmed to NBC News that it had carried out strikes in the area of a hospital or medical facility in seven of the 15 incidents NBC News documented from April to June this year, including strikes in the area of Al-Awda Hospital, the Indonesian Hospital, the European Hospital and Al-Ahli Hospital. It had previously confirmed a seventh strike at Nasser Hospital in a separate statement.
Two of the strikes the IDF confirmed were in the area of Al-Awda Hospital, with the Israeli military saying one strike, on May 24, had targeted the commander of a Palestinian Islamic Jihad sniper cell. It said another, carried out two days prior, on May 22, had targeted “several military structures” about 200 yards away from hospital coordinates provided by NBC News.
The IDF said an attack on the European Hospital on May 13 had targeted senior Hamas members in what it said was a command and control center underneath the hospital. Meanwhile, it said an attack in the area of the Indonesian Hospital on May 18 was targeting “several operational infrastructures” belonging to Hamas.
It added that an attack on Al-Ahli Hospital on April 13 had also targeted a command and control center used by Hamas, but said it did not have any record of strikes in the other eight incidents NBC News asked about.
As strikes continue to shut down functions of Gaza’s hospitals, it adds pressure to those that remain open, increasingly overwhelmed by large numbers of wounded patients and choked by shortages of medical supplies that are still deeply depleted after a nearly three-month blockade imposed by Israel. While Israel has begun to allow some aid in, what is entering is far short of what’s needed.
“We are swimming in a pool of blood,” Mohammad Sakr, nursing director for Nasser Hospital, told NBC News. “We need international health organizations to interfere and support us with medical supplies as soon as possible.”
