The morgue at Gaza’s biggest hospital is overflowing as Israeli attacks intensify

People stand by the bodies of victims of Israeli air strikes outside the morgue of Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City on October 12, 2023. (AFP)
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Updated 13 October 2023
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The morgue at Gaza’s biggest hospital is overflowing as Israeli attacks intensify

  • “The body bags started and just kept coming and coming and now it’s a graveyard,” nurse says

GAZA CITY: The morgue at Gaza’s biggest hospital overflowed Thursday as bodies came in faster than relatives could claim them on the sixth day of Israel’s heavy aerial bombardment on the territory of 2.3 million people.
With scores of Palestinians killed each day in the Israeli onslaught after an unprecedented Hamas attack, medics in the besieged enclave said they ran out of places to put remains pulled from the latest strikes or recovered from under the ruins of demolished buildings.
The morgue at Gaza City’s Shifa hospital can only handle some 30 bodies at a time, and workers had to stack corpses three high outside the walk-in cooler and put dozens more, side by side, in the parking lot.
“The body bags started and just kept coming and coming and now it’s a graveyard,” Abu Elias Shobaki, a nurse at Shifa, said of the parking lot. “I am emotionally, physically exhausted. I just have to stop myself from thinking about how much worse it will get.”

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Nearly a week after Hamas militants crossed through Israel’s highly fortified separation fence and killed over 1,200 Israelis in a brutal rampage, Israel is preparing for a possible ground invasion of Gaza for the first time in nearly a decade. A ground offensive would likely drive up the Palestinian death toll, which already has outpaced the past four bloody wars between Israel and Hamas.
Already, the sheer volume of human remains has pushed the system to its limit in the long-blockaded territory. Gaza’s hospitals are poorly supplied in quiet times but now Israel has stopped the water flow from its national water company and blocked even electricity, food and fuel from entering the coastal enclave.
“We are in a critical situation,” said Ashraf Al-Qidra, the spokesman for the Gaza Health Ministry. “Ambulances can’t get to the wounded, the wounded can’t get to intensive care, the dead can’t get to the morgue.”
Lines of white body bags – soles of bare feet sticking out from one, a bloodied arm from another – brought the scale and intensity of Israel’s retaliation on Gaza into sharp relief.
Israel’s campaign on Gaza has leveled entire neighborhoods, killing over 1,400 people – over 60 percent of them women and minors, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. More than 340,000 have been displaced, or 15 percent of Gaza’s population.
The Israeli military says it is striking Hamas militant infrastructure and aims to avoid civilian casualties — a claim that Palestinians reject.
Those deaths, and over 6,000 injuries, have overwhelmed Gaza’s health care facilities as supplies dwindle.
“It is not possible, under any circumstances, to continue this work,” said Mohammad Abu Selim, the general director of Shifa. “The patients are now on the streets. The wounded are on the streets. We cannot find a bed for them.”
After the heavy bombing of the Shati refugee camp just north of Gaza City along the Mediterranean coast on Thursday, a new wave of people streamed into the hospital complex – toddlers with bruises and bandages, men with makeshift tourniquets, young girls with blood caked on their faces. Because Shifa’s intensive care unit was full, some of the wounded lay in the hospital corridors, pressing up against the walls to clear aisles for staff and stretchers.
Making matters worse, Gaza’s sole power plant ran out of fuel on Wednesday. Shifa and other hospitals are desperately trying to save whatever diesel remains in their backup generators, turning off the lights in all hospital departments but the most essential — intensive care, operating rooms, oxygen stations.
Abu Selima, director of Shifa, said the last of the hospital’s fuel would run out in three or four days.
When that happens, “a disaster will occur within five minutes,” said Naser Bolbol, head of the hospital’s nursery department, citing all the oxygen equipment keeping infants alive.
Hospital authorities said there wouldn’t be electricity left to refrigerate the dead, either.


Hamas says ‘new’ Israeli conditions delaying agreement on Gaza ceasefire

Updated 7 min 54 sec ago
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Hamas says ‘new’ Israeli conditions delaying agreement on Gaza ceasefire

  • “Occupation has set new conditions concerning withdrawal (of troops), the ceasefire, prisoners, and the return of displaced people,” Hamas said

JERUSALEM: Hamas accused Israel on Wednesday of imposing “new conditions” that it said were delaying a ceasefire agreement in the war in Gaza, though it acknowledged negotiations were still ongoing.
Israel has made no public statement about any new conditions in its efforts to secure the release of hostages seized on October 7, 2023.
Indirect talks between Israel and Hamas, mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the United States, have taken place in Doha in recent days, rekindling hope for a truce deal that has proven elusive.
“The ceasefire and prisoner exchange negotiations are continuing in Doha under the mediation of Qatar and Egypt in a serious manner... but the occupation has set new conditions concerning withdrawal (of troops), the ceasefire, prisoners, and the return of displaced people, which has delayed reaching an agreement,” the Palestinian militant group said in a statement.
Hamas did not elaborate on the conditions imposed by Israel.
On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told parliament that there was “some progress” in the talks, and on Tuesday his office said Israeli representatives had returned from Qatar after “significant negotiations.”
Last week, Hamas and two other Palestinian militant groups — Islamic Jihad and the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine — said in a rare joint statement that a ceasefire agreement was “closer than ever,” provided Israel did not impose new conditions.
Efforts to strike a truce and hostage release deal have repeatedly failed over key stumbling blocks.
Despite numerous rounds of indirect talks, Israel and Hamas have agreed just one truce, which lasted for a week at the end of 2023.
Negotiations have faced multiple challenges since then, with the primary point of disagreement being the establishment of a lasting ceasefire in Gaza.
Another unresolved issue is the governance of post-war Gaza.
It remains a highly contentious issue, including within the Palestinian leadership.
Israel has said repeatedly that it will not allow Hamas to run the territory ever again.
In an interview with The Wall Street Journal last week, Netanyahu said: “I’m not going to agree to end the war before we remove Hamas.”
He added Israel is “not going to leave them in power in Gaza, 30 miles from Tel Aviv. It’s not going to happen.”
Netanyahu has also repeatedly stated that he does not want to withdraw Israeli troops from the Philadelphi Corridor, a strip of land cleared and controlled by Israel along Gaza’s border with Egypt.
The war in Gaza was sparked by Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel, during which militants seized 251 hostages.
Ninety-six of them are still being held in Gaza, including 34 the army says are dead.
The attack resulted in 1,208 deaths, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory campaign has killed at least 45,361 people in Gaza, a majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry that the UN considers reliable.


Syria authorities say 1 million captagon pills torched

Updated 25 December 2024
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Syria authorities say 1 million captagon pills torched

  • Forces pour fuel over and set fire to a cache of cannabis, the painkiller tramadol and around 50 bags of pink captagon pills in the capital’s security compound.

DAMASCUS: Syria’s new authorities torched a large stockpile of drugs on Wednesday, two security officials told AFP, including one million pills of the amphetamine-like stimulant captagon, whose industrial-scale production flourished under ousted president Bashar Assad.
“We found a large quantity of captagon, around one million pills,” said a member of the security forces, who asked to be identified only by his first name, Osama. An AFP journalist saw forces pour fuel over and set fire to a cache of cannabis, the painkiller tramadol and around 50 bags of pink captagon pills in the capital’s security compound.


UK to host Israel-Palestine peace summit

Updated 25 December 2024
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UK to host Israel-Palestine peace summit

  • PM Starmer drawing on experience working on Northern Ireland peace process
  • G7 fund to unlock financing for reconciliation projects

LONDON: The UK will host an international summit early next year aimed at bringing long-term peace to Israel and Palestine, The Independent reported.

The event will launch the International Fund for Israeli-Palestinian Peace, which is backed by the Alliance for Middle East Peace, containing more than 160 organizations engaged in peacebuilding between Israelis and Palestinians.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who worked on the Northern Ireland peace process, ordered Foreign Secretary David Lammy to begin work on hosting the summit.

The fund being unlocked alongside the summit pools money from G7 countries to build “an environment conducive to peacemaking.” The US opened the fund with a $250 million donation in 2020.

As part of peacebuilding efforts, the fund supports projects “to help build the foundation for peaceful co-existence between Israelis and Palestinians and for a sustainable two-state solution.”

It also supports reconciliation between Arab and Jewish citizens of Israel, as well as the development of the Palestinian private sector in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Young Israelis and Palestinians will meet and work together during internships in G7 countries as part of the scheme.

Former Labour Shadow Middle East Minister Wayne David and ex-Conservative Middle East Minister Alistair Burt said the fund is vital in bringing an end to the conflict.

In a joint piece for The Independent, they said: “The prime minister’s pledge reflects growing global momentum to support peacebuilding efforts from the ground up, ensuring that the voices of those who have long worked for equality, security and dignity for all are not only heard, but are actively shaping the societal and political conditions that real conflict resolution will require.

“Starmer’s announcement that the foreign secretary will host an inaugural meeting in London to support peacebuilders is a vital first step … This meeting will help to solidify the UK’s role as a leader in shaping the future of the region.”

The fund is modeled on the International Fund for Ireland, which spurred peacebuilding efforts in the lead-up to the 1999 Good Friday Agreement. Starmer is drawing inspiration from his work in Northern Ireland to shape the scheme.

He served as human rights adviser to the Northern Ireland Policing Board from 2003-2007, monitoring the service’s compliance with human rights law introduced through the Good Friday Agreement.

David and Burt said the UK is “a natural convener” for the new scheme, adding: “That role is needed now more than ever.”

They said: “The British government is in a good position to do this for three reasons: Firstly, the very public reaching out to diplomatic partners, and joint ministerial visits, emphasises the government turning a page on its key relationships.

“Secondly, Britain retains a significant influence in the Middle East, often bridging across those who may have differences with each other. And, thirdly, there is the experience of Northern Ireland.

“Because of his personal and professional engagement with Northern Ireland, Keir Starmer is fully aware of the important role civil society has played in helping to lay the foundations for peace.”


Erdogan announces plans to open Turkish consulate in Aleppo

Updated 25 December 2024
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Erdogan announces plans to open Turkish consulate in Aleppo

  • Erdogan also issued a stern warning to Kurdish militants in Syria

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced on Wednesday that Turkiye will soon open a consulate in Syria's Aleppo.

Erdogan also issued a stern warning to Kurdish militants in Syria, stating they must either "lay down their weapons or be buried in Syrian lands with their weapons."

The remarks underscore Turkiye's firm stance on combating Kurdish groups it views as a threat to its national security.


Turkish military kills 21 Kurdish militants in northern Syria and Iraq, ministry says

Updated 25 December 2024
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Turkish military kills 21 Kurdish militants in northern Syria and Iraq, ministry says

  • Turkiye regards the YPG, the leading force within the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), as an extension of the PKK and similarly classifies it as a terrorist group

ANKARA: The Turkish military killed 21 Kurdish militants in northern Syria and Iraq, the defense ministry said on Wednesday.
In a statement, the ministry reported that 20 Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and Syrian Kurdish YPG militants, who were preparing to launch an attack, were killed in northern Syria, while one militant was killed in northern Iraq.
“Our operations will continue effectively and resolutely,” the ministry added.
The PKK, designated as a terrorist organization by Turkiye, the European Union, and the United States, began its armed insurgency against the Turkish state in 1984. The conflict has claimed more than 40,000 lives.
Turkiye regards the YPG, the leading force within the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), as an extension of the PKK and similarly classifies it as a terrorist group.
Following the fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad earlier this month, Ankara has repeatedly insisted that the YPG must disband, asserting that the group has no place in Syria’s future.
The operations on Wednesday come amid ongoing hostilities in northeastern Syria between Turkiye-backed Syrian factions and the YPG.
Ankara routinely conducts cross-border airstrikes and military operations targeting the PKK, which maintains bases in the mountainous regions of northern Iraq.