Israeli strike on Gaza hospital kills at least 6, including doctor and child, Palestinian officials say

An Israeli strike on a hospital in southern Gaza overnight Wednesday killed at least six people, including a doctor and a child, Palestinian officials say.

The strike on Nasser Hospital shortly after midnight hit the complex’s surgery unit, according to a Gaza Civil Defense spokesman. The attack tore through part of the hospital, Ezz Eddine Abu Sabha said, leaving charred debris scattered across the destroyed unit.

The strike killed 52-year-old Dr. Rizk Abu Shaira, Abu Sabha said, as well as a 13-year-old boy who was supposed to have surgery. A total of 40 people were injured in the Israeli strike, including two doctors who are in critical condition.

“People of the world … where can the people of Gaza go? Tents flood, cliffs collapse onto children, and hospitals are bombed with people inside. There is no time for blankets – or tears – to dry,” Dr. Munir Al-Bursh, director-general of Gaza’s Health Ministry, wrote on Facebook.

“Gaza does not ask the world to count its dead … It demands protection for those still alive,” he added.

Footage from inside the hospital showed two bombs, one of which failed to explode. A label on the bomb identified it as a US-manufactured GBU-39/B, a 250-pound bomb that has been supplied to Israel.

“I was asleep when suddenly I was covered with dust and glass,” said Atiya Abu Basir, an elderly patient at the hospital. “I couldn’t walk because I just had surgery.”

Despite a nominal US-brokered ceasefire agreed more than a year ago, Israel has carried out near-daily strikes in Gaza. According to the United Nations, Israeli forces have killed more than 1,400 people in Gaza since the ceasefire, and there is no fully functioning hospital in the devastated enclave.