Return of captives will be spun as army success story
The return of the captives is going to be spun as a real successful operation for the Israelis. We’re hearing that at least 47 Palestinians were killed but no mention of that from the Israeli army spokesperson, the PM or the foreign minister.
We don’t have an actual figure of how many people were injured in this raid that took place by air, land and sea with the involvement of at least one helicopter.
The cost of this operation? Well, the Israelis simply are not talking about it and will not talk about that because they want to spin this as a success story.
PM Netanyahu was under tremendous pressure from the Hostages and Missing Families Forum to commit to a ceasefire to bring all of these people back. The forum is very clear: The ceasefire is the best and the most sensible option to get all of the 120 captives that are still in Gaza.
Almog Meir Jan, 21, one of four captives who were just rescued, arrives by helicopter at the Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan, Israel, Saturday
He looks in very good condition for all the horror stories of Hamas torturing the hostages.... Nothing like how Israel returns Palestinian hostages back to Gaza.
Israeli forces ‘destroying’ health system across Gaza
More from the Al-Aqsa Hospital spokesman Khalil al-Degran:
- “A lot of martyrs and wounded” are still in the streets following the attack on the refugee camps.
- Israeli forces are committing “brutal massacres regularly” and “destroying” the health system across the Gaza Strip.
- This is the only hospital that can provide healthcare for the one million displaced people, and they “suffer” due to shortages of medical staff and supplies.
- The hospital is full of patients and there is no space for more people.
- Al-Aqsa Hospital is now running on one generator – if it stops working, a “catastrophe is waiting for every one of us”.
- He says the hospital needs an “urgent intervention” to save the hospital and urges Palestinians in the area to go to the hospital “immediately” to donate blood.
- “We condemn the Israeli attack against Al Nuseirat refugee camp and the central governate [Deir el-Balah], and we urge the international community [and] international organisations to do whatever it takes to stop this brutal by the Israeli forces.”
Palestinians wounded in the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip are treated at al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al Balah on Saturday
Scenes from Al-Aqsa Hospital
Only 1 operational generator means oxygen supply won’t work: MSF doctor
With just one generator operating at Al-Aqsa Hospital, Dr Tanya Haj-Hassan, a pediatric intensive care doctor with Doctors Without Borders (MSF), says this means the oxygen supply won’t work.
“The ventilators won’t function,” she told Al Jazeera. “The emergency department doesn’t have windows which means it’s dark and they don’t have light. People use the flash on their phones.”
She said this is all happening when the hospital has no internet connection. Her colleagues had been messaging her but her messages can no longer go through any more.
“This is all in a state when it’s already completely chaotic,” she said.
Al-Aqsa Hospital ‘looks like a slaughterhouse’
Dr Tanya Haj-Hassan, a paediatric intensive care doctor with Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, says the emergency department at Al-Aqsa Hospital “is a complete bloodbath … it looks like a slaughterhouse”.
“The images and videos that I’ve received show patients lying everywhere in pools of blood … their limbs have been blown off,” she told Al Jazeera.
“That is what a massacre looks like. It means parents running around caring for their children who have blood running from their head trying to find a medic to treat them. But it’s so chaotic and there’s so many patients that is vastly outnumbering the healthcare ability to care for them.”
