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At least 12 hospitals and 32 clinics in the Gaza Strip have been shut due to a lack of power and the damage caused by Israeli air strikes, the Palestinian Health Ministry has said.
The closures have come in the two weeks since the deadly Hamas attack in southern Israel that led to a retaliatory siege of Gaza and heavy air strikes, resulting in the killing of more than 5,000 Palestinians and displacement of over one million.
One Red Cross official working closely on the crisis told The National that hospitals were now so over-crowded, many people were taking refuge "in stairwells."
“Since 7 October, 12 hospitals and 32 primary care clinics across Gaza have been forced to shut down due to damage they had sustained or lack of electricity and supplies,” the Palestinian Health Ministry said on Tuesday.
The enclave's Al Shifaa hospital, which is harbouring 45,000 displaced people and more than 600 wounded and injured patients, is on the verge of collapse as it runs out of medical supplies and beds, Dr Marwan Abu Saad, director general of health co-operation at the ministry, told The National.
Hospitals are full and cannot keep up with the influx of people and an increase in electricity and water consumption, officials said. Aid lorries carrying food, water and medicine have begun to enter Palestinian territory through Egypt's Rafah crossing but humanitarian groups have said this is a “drop in the ocean” of what is needed.
Gaza's health system has reached “the worse stage in its history”, said Ashraf Al Qudra, spokesman for the ministry on social media platform X, previously known as Twitter.
Dr Abu Saad said they were attempting to find solutions “but they are not realistic”.
“If the air strikes continue, then we will not be able to cater to this amount of people,” he said.
“The hospital and its surrounding [area have] been targeted various times and every hour we receive a huge number of patients. We don't have any more beds to offer, so the majority of new patients are getting treatment on the floor.”
A collapse of health services at the hospital could come within hours, Dr Abu Saad said.
The Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza’s Beit Lahia area was shut down after running out of power, Hamas said, with the militant group accusing Israel of committing “crimes against humanity”.
Health workers are “seeing people die” every minute, Atif Khloot, general manager of the Indonesian Hospital, told The National.
“The hospital has totally collapsed and the world has signed off on the murder of sick patients,” he said.
“We are urging the international community to focus and provide international aid and doctors for Gaza's healthcare system,” Mr Khloot said.
The hospital needs at least 2,000 litres of fuel a day to operate.
Humanitarian groups have warned that Gaza urgently needs fuel supplies to power desalination plants, pump drinking water and operate life-saving equipment.
Hospitals, particularly in the north, are “inundated”, Jessica Moussan, the International Committee of the Red Cross media adviser for the Middle East, told The National.
“Staff are overwhelmed, resources are depleting and many are seeking refuge within these hospital walls, with some even finding shelter in stairwells,” Ms Moussan said.
“Health care is most vulnerable, yet most needed.”
Medical teams are working under “appalling conditions” and are “emotionally and physically drained”, apart from facing significant threats to their own safety, she said.
Doctors are treating doctors and nurses treating nurses “in a cycle that should never be”, she said.
No Shame
Lily Allen
(Parlophone)
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Lexus LX700h specs
Engine: 3.4-litre twin-turbo V6 plus supplementary electric motor
Power: 464hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 790Nm from 2,000-3,600rpm
Transmission: 10-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 11.7L/100km
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Price: From Dh590,000
Miss Granny
Director: Joyce Bernal
Starring: Sarah Geronimo, James Reid, Xian Lim, Nova Villa
3/5
(Tagalog with Eng/Ar subtitles)
Fighting with My Family
Director: Stephen Merchant
Stars: Dwayne Johnson, Nick Frost, Lena Headey, Florence Pugh, Thomas Whilley, Tori Ellen Ross, Jack Lowden, Olivia Bernstone, Elroy Powell
Four stars
Results:
5pm: Abu Dhabi Fillies Classic (PA) Prestige Dh 110,000 1.400m | Winner: AF Mouthirah, Tadhg O’Shea (jockey), Ernst Oertel (trainer)
5.30pm: Abu Dhabi Colts Classic (PA) Prestige Dh 110,000 1,400m | Winner: AF Saab, Antonio Fresu, Ernst Oertel
6pm: Maiden (PA) Dh 80,000 1,600m | Winner: Majd Al Gharbia, Saif Al Balushi, Ridha ben Attia
6.30pm: Abu Dhabi Championship (PA) Listed Dh 180,000 1,600m | Winner: RB Money To Burn, Pat Cosgrave, Eric Lemartinel
7pm: Wathba Stallions Cup (PA) Handicap Dh 70,000 2,200m | Winner: AF Kafu, Tadhg O’Shea, Ernst Oertel
7.30pm: Handicap (PA) Dh 100,000 2,400m | Winner: Brass Ring, Fabrice Veron, Ismail Mohammed
Our legal columnist
Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
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'Falling%20for%20Christmas'
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Meydan card
6.30pm: Al Maktoum Challenge Round-1 (PA) Group 1 US$65,000 (Dirt) 1,600m
7.05pm: Conditions (TB) $100,000 (Turf) 1,400m
7.40pm: UAE 2000 Guineas Trial (TB) $100,000 (D) 1,600m
8.15pm: Handicap (TB) $175,000 (T) 1,200m
8.50pm: Al Maktoum Challenge Round-1 (TB) Group 2 $350,000 (D) 1,600m
9.25pm: Handicap (TB) $175,000 (D) 1,900m
10pm: Handicap (TB) $135,000 (T) 1,600m
HIV on the rise in the region
A 2019 United Nations special analysis on Aids reveals 37 per cent of new HIV infections in the Mena region are from people injecting drugs.
New HIV infections have also risen by 29 per cent in western Europe and Asia, and by 7 per cent in Latin America, but declined elsewhere.
Egypt has shown the highest increase in recorded cases of HIV since 2010, up by 196 per cent.
Access to HIV testing, treatment and care in the region is well below the global average.
Few statistics have been published on the number of cases in the UAE, although a UNAIDS report said 1.5 per cent of the prison population has the virus.
Captain Marvel
Director: Anna Boden, Ryan Fleck
Starring: Brie Larson, Samuel L Jackson, Jude Law, Ben Mendelsohn
4/5 stars
Evacuations to France hit by controversy
- Over 500 Gazans have been evacuated to France since November 2023
- Evacuations were paused after a student already in France posted anti-Semitic content and was subsequently expelled to Qatar
- The Foreign Ministry launched a review to determine how authorities failed to detect the posts before her entry
- Artists and researchers fall under a programme called Pause that began in 2017
- It has benefited more than 700 people from 44 countries, including Syria, Turkey, Iran, and Sudan
- Since the start of the Gaza war, it has also included 45 Gazan beneficiaries
- Unlike students, they are allowed to bring their families to France
