At least 12 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli air strikes on Gaza, medics said, as Israeli forces continue to press their siege and ground assault on the northern part of the Palestinian territory.
Medics in Gaza told the Reuters news agency on Monday at least seven people were killed in an attack on the north Gaza city of Beit Lahiya.
Five others were killed in attacks in central and southern Gaza.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza said that the Kamal Adwan Hospital, the last partially functioning hospital in the north of the enclave, was being attacked by Israeli forces.
“At this moment, occupation forces are continuing to violently bombard and destroy Kamal Adwan Hospital, targeting all parts of the hospital,” the ministry said.
Hospital director Hossam Abu Safieh said in a statement that the situation was “catastrophic”, and that “the army did not contact the hospital before directly targeting it”.
“Several of our staff have been injured, and we are unable to leave the hospital,” he said.
“We do not understand the purpose behind this bombing that is targeting the hospital.”
Reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said this is the second time in recent weeks that the hospital had been attacked.
“The hospital does not operate as a health facility now. It’s more of accommodating injuries and the dead who are brought to the hospital,” Mahmoud said.
“The entire northern part of the strip is left without any proper healthcare facility, the whole healthcare system is gone, is completely collapsing … and civilians are left without any proper access to that,” he added.
Israel’s military began a siege and ground assault on northern Gaza on October 5 in what it said was an operation to prevent Hamas fighters from regrouping there.
Palestinians say the new offensives and orders for people to leave were aimed at emptying two northern Gaza towns and a refugee camp to create buffer zones. Israel denies this.
Since Israel launched its war on Gaza in October 2023, at least 43,374 people have been killed in the enclave, and 102,261 others wounded, according to Palestinian health authorities.
The Israeli assault came in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7 2023, in which at least 1,139 people were killed, according to an Al Jazeera tally based on Israeli statistics, and around 250 others were seized as hostages.
‘Unspeakable suffering’
Earlier on Monday, Israel announced that it had informed the United Nations it was ending its relations with the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), despite international calls for the importance of the UN agency in providing aid.
UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini said that along with banning the agency, Israel had also scaled back the entry of aid trucks into Gaza to an average of 30 trucks a day, which “cannot meet the needs of two million people.”
“Restricting humanitarian access and at the same time dismantling UNRWA will add an additional layer of suffering to already unspeakable suffering,” Lazzarini said.
An Israeli government spokesperson said no limit had been imposed on aid entering Gaza, with 47 aid trucks entering northern Gaza on Sunday.
