MSF aid workers among thousands affected by Deir el-Balah offensive
Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, says the forced displacement threat that preceded the Israeli army’s ground invasion of Deir el-Balah has already displaced up to 80,000 Palestinians.
Among them were 36 staff members of the medical aid group, who worked in the al-Mawasi clinic and had to abruptly leave a busy health facility while treating an influx of patients wounded near distribution sites run by the notorious Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
In a statement, the MSF also pointed out that the forced evacuation also impacted one of the main lifelines for water distribution in southern Gaza.
“Today water distribution trucks could not reach the plant, and these orders will put at risk anyone who tries to distribute water from here in the near future,” it said.
Forced displacement areas by the Israeli army now encompass 87 percent of the enclave, said the MSF.
‘Systemic destruction project’ as Israel clears Gaza of Palestinians
A columnist for Israel’s Haaretz newspaper says the ethnic cleansing happening now in Gaza is comparable to what the Nazis did in their early years, and it must be immediately stopped.
“There’s now a very systemic destruction project of whole towns and villages, one after the other,” Gideon Levy told Al Jazeera. “Israel is doing things that the Germans did in the early years of the Third Reich, which Israelis don’t see any similarity.”
He said Israeli politicians and the media are giving “unbelievable explanations and legitimisations”, such as fighting Hamas to justify the total destruction and emptying of Gaza.
“Killing 27,000 children is self-defence. At the same time, nobody is looking backward to their own family’s experience,” said Levy.
“I must remind all of us: The extermination of the Jews in the Holocaust started with evacuating people to the east [of Europe]. Same plan. That’s the first stage. We should stop it here. But Israel doesn’t see its own image. We don’t look in the mirror.”
WHO says staff residence in Gaza raided by Israeli troops
The World Health Organization (WHO) says its staff residence and main warehouse in Deir el-Balah were attacked three times by Israeli forces.
Two WHO staff and two family members were detained, said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO’s director-general. Three were later released, while one staff member remains in detention.
“Israeli military entered the premises, forcing women and children to evacuate on foot toward al-Mawasi amid active conflict,” said Tedros. “WHO demands the immediate release of the detained staff and protection of all its staff.”
Israeli tanks and troops pushed into southern and eastern districts of central Gaza’s Deir el-Balah city for the first time during the 21-month war on Monday.
