Israel’s Rafah assault could halt last functioning hospital, WHO warns
Al Jazeera
WHO says a ‘full incursion’ into the Gaza city will only leave ill-equipped field hospitals and additional mortality.
A World Health Organization official said the last working hospital in Rafah could stop functioning and a substantial number of deaths could be expected if Israel launches a “full incursion” into the southern Gaza City.
“If the incursion would continue, we would lose the last hospital in Rafah,” Richard Peeperkorn, the WHO representative for Gaza and the occupied West Bank, said on the sidelines of the World Health Assembly in Geneva on Tuesday.
He said that in the case of a “full incursion”, a contingency plan involving treating patients in a string of ill-equipped field hospitals “will not prevent what we expect: substantial additional mortality and morbidity”.
The comments came as Israeli tanks were reported to have advanced into the centre of Rafah.
Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from central Gaza’s Deir el-Balah, said Israeli tanks are “pushing deeper into Rafah right now from two major axes”.
