Surgeon Flees Gaza City’s Last Functioning Hospital after Anesthetics Run Out

Smoke billows following an air strike on the northern part of the Gaza Strip, as seen from Sderot, southern Israel, 17 November 2023. (EPA)
Smoke billows following an air strike on the northern part of the Gaza Strip, as seen from Sderot, southern Israel, 17 November 2023. (EPA)
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Surgeon Flees Gaza City’s Last Functioning Hospital after Anesthetics Run Out

Smoke billows following an air strike on the northern part of the Gaza Strip, as seen from Sderot, southern Israel, 17 November 2023. (EPA)
Smoke billows following an air strike on the northern part of the Gaza Strip, as seen from Sderot, southern Israel, 17 November 2023. (EPA)

Hundreds of patients desperately needed his help, but now there was nothing he could do.

With Al Ahli hospital shaking from Israeli tank fire and no more anesthetics left to operate, British-Palestinian surgeon Ghassan Abu Sitta told his team it was time to leave the last fully functioning hospital in Gaza City.

"It has been a living nightmare - leaving 500 wounded knowing that there's nothing left for you to be able to do for them, it's just the most heartbreaking thing I ever had to do," Abu Sitta told Reuters on Friday, a day after leaving the hospital and walking to Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.

In a post on X, he wrote: "No longer able to provide surgeries at Ahli Hosp. The hospital is now effectively a first aid station. Hundreds of wounded now at hospital with no access to surgery. They will die from their wounds."

Israel has ordered the entire northern half of the Gaza Strip, including Gaza City, to be evacuated as it presses its campaign to wipe out the Hamas group that governs the territory. All northern hospitals have effectively ceased functioning.

Gaza's health ministry said that as of Nov. 16 only nine of the enclave's 35 hospitals were functioning even partially.

Earlier this week, it put the confirmed Palestinian death toll at over 11,500, including at least 4,700 children, but has said communications blackouts throughout the territory have made it impossible to provide regular updates.

Gaza hospitals have been overwhelmed and short of supplies since Israeli forces began their campaign to wipe out Hamas following the Palestinian militant group's Oct. 7 attack on Israel, which Israel said killed about 1,200 people.

"Al Ahli was completely inundated with wounded. And we were operating all through the night (on Wednesday)," Abu Sitta said in an internet call. "And by the early hours (of Thursday) ... we realized that we have basically run out of medication for the anesthetic machines and we had to stop the operating room."

‘Inundated with wounded’

Abu Sitta said he and his team had been particularly busy in the past week treating patients after an Israeli air strike on a nearby mosque, and after Israeli forces surrounded and then entered Gaza's biggest hospital, Al Shifa.

Abu Sitta said a message had been received at Al Ahli hospital saying it had been surrounded by Israeli tanks.

Reuters could not immediately verify the situation at and around Al Ahli. Israel's military says Hamas has tunnels and command centers beneath and adjacent to some hospitals, a charge Hamas denies.

Hamas' armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, said on Friday that no hostages taken during the Oct. 7 attack were being held at hospitals, but were taken to care centers for treatment due to the seriousness of their condition and to save their lives.

On the five-hour walk from Al Ahli to the refugee camp, Abu Sitta said he saw "scenes of destruction" and bodies lying on the street.

He said patients needing treatment remained at Al Ahli, and that another hospital in northern Gaza had been unable to take them.

"Basically, the whole of northern Gaza now has no functioning hospital," he said.

His immediate plan is to rest.

"We've been operating non-stop for the last week since Al Shifa (was surrounded). I just made the decision that I needed to sleep, until I figure out what I wanted to do next," he said.



Israeli Strikes Kill 12 in Lebanon, including 5 Hezbollah Fighters

Women walk near destroyed buildings, with one holding the flag of Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila, after an Israeli military spokesperson said that Israel would keep troops in several posts in southern Lebanon past the deadline for them to withdraw, February 18, 2025 - Reuters reported.
Women walk near destroyed buildings, with one holding the flag of Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila, after an Israeli military spokesperson said that Israel would keep troops in several posts in southern Lebanon past the deadline for them to withdraw, February 18, 2025 - Reuters reported.
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Israeli Strikes Kill 12 in Lebanon, including 5 Hezbollah Fighters

Women walk near destroyed buildings, with one holding the flag of Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila, after an Israeli military spokesperson said that Israel would keep troops in several posts in southern Lebanon past the deadline for them to withdraw, February 18, 2025 - Reuters reported.
Women walk near destroyed buildings, with one holding the flag of Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila, after an Israeli military spokesperson said that Israel would keep troops in several posts in southern Lebanon past the deadline for them to withdraw, February 18, 2025 - Reuters reported.

Heavy Israeli airstrikes killed 12 people, including five Hezbollah fighters, in eastern Lebanon on Tuesday, a security source in Lebanon said, in what Israel said was a warning to the Iran-backed group against trying to re-establish itself.

The Israeli military said the airstrikes targeted training camps used by elite Hezbollah fighters and warehouses it used to store weapons in the Bekaa Valley region of eastern Lebanon.

The airstrikes were the deadliest on the area since a US-brokered ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel last November. Bachir Khodr, governor of the Bekaa region, said seven of the dead were Syrian nationals.

Israel dealt Hezbollah heavy blows in last year's conflict, killing its leader Hassan Nasrallah along with other commanders and destroying much of its arsenal.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Tuesday's strikes sent a "clear message" to Hezbollah, accusing it of planning to rebuild the capability to raid Israel through the elite Radwan force, Reuters reported.

Israel "will respond with maximum force to any attempt at rebuilding", he said. He added that strikes were also a message to the Lebanese government, saying it was responsible for upholding the ceasefire agreement.

There was no immediate public response from Hezbollah or from the Lebanese government to the latest Israeli strikes.

The United States has submitted a proposal to the Lebanese government aimed at securing Hezbollah's disarmament within four months in exchange for Israel halting airstrikes and withdrawing troops from positions they still hold in south Lebanon.

Under the terms of the ceasefire brokered by the US and France, Lebanon's armed forces were to confiscate "all unauthorized arms", beginning in the area south of the Litani River - the zone closest to Israel.