( File photo )  A large fire erupted at the intensive care unit (ICU) of Kamal Adwan Hospital as a result of Israel’s heavy artillery shelling near the facility in Gaza.

Gaza City, December 18 (RHC)-- The director of Kamal Adwan Hospital says a large fire erupted at the intensive care unit (ICU) as a result of Israel’s heavy artillery shelling near the hospital on Wednesday.   Doctor Hussam Abu Safiya said following a night of relentless attacks on the hospital, the regime's tanks opened fire at the facility early on Wednesday, causing a massive fire to break out in its intensive care unit.

Images circulating on social media shows the fire in the ICU.  “Crazy gunfire was fired at the hospital with all kinds of weapons, and the occupation deliberately targeted the intensive care unit by firing at it clearly,” Safiya said in a message on X.   He said the patients on ventilators were “miraculously” evacuated as the fire broke out. 

The director said the facility's ICU is the only specialised care department operating in northern Gaza. It is currently out of service.  “We have appealed to the world for more than 75 days to provide protection for the health system and its workers, but there is no response."

The regime's forces have been attacking the hospital and its surroundings for several days, destroying essential equipment, including water and oxygen tanks.   Safiya said earlier that staff and patients are enduring “difficult hours without electricity, oxygen or water” in the hospital.

The World Health Organization’s (WHO) regional director for the Eastern Mediterranean Hanan Balkhy took to X on Wednesday, describing the fear endured by the hospital’s staff and patients in recent days as “indescribable – and unacceptable.”

The WHO said an international medical team urgently needed at the northern Gaza hospital has not been allowed to deploy to the besieged area.

The director of Kamal Adwan Hospital says the health facility will soon "turn into a graveyard for everyone inside the hospital.”
 

The besieged population of northern Gaza have been facing starvation, displacement and annihilation amid relentless bombardment and suffocating restrictions on life-saving humanitarian aid for more than two months.