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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)
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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.

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Arab World

US Wants Netanyahu to Condemn Settler Siege in Palestinian Village

Soldiers evacuate Israeli settlers before dismantling their tent in front of one of the three homes belonging to Palestinian families besieged by settlers for six days in Qusra (AP)
Soldiers evacuate Israeli settlers before dismantling their tent in front of one of the three homes belonging to Palestinian families besieged by settlers for six days in Qusra (AP)
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US Wants Netanyahu to Condemn Settler Siege in Palestinian Village

Soldiers evacuate Israeli settlers before dismantling their tent in front of one of the three homes belonging to Palestinian families besieged by settlers for six days in Qusra (AP)
Soldiers evacuate Israeli settlers before dismantling their tent in front of one of the three homes belonging to Palestinian families besieged by settlers for six days in Qusra (AP)

The United States wants Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to publicly condemn a siege imposed by Jewish settlers in a Palestinian village, US and Israeli officials said on Friday, as settlers pressured residents by pitching a new tent before Israeli soldiers arrived and it was taken down.

Settlers have been besieging homes in Qusra in the occupied West Bank for almost a week, trapping Palestinians in an area where rights groups say settlers are mounting a concerted effort to seize more land, further eating into territory where Palestinians aim to establish a state.

The siege has drawn public US criticism: the US Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee — a strong supporter of Jewish settlement in the West Bank — on Thursday condemned settlers besieging a Palestinian home as "Israeli terrorists".

A US official and an Israeli official said on Friday White House officials are pressing Netanyahu to publicly condemn the siege.

Washington began to protest after learning that the home of a Palestinian-American was among those under siege, said the two officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe sensitive discussions, of which they had knowledge.

Netanyahu has not commented on the siege in Qusra. Neither his office nor the White House immediately responded to requests for comment.

Settler violence in the West Bank has risen during the three years since the Hamas-led October 7 attacks on Israel.

Condemning settlers could be politically risky for Netanyahu some two months before an election, potentially upsetting settler voters upon whom parts of his right-wing coalition rely. Opinion polls show Netanyahu could lose power, his security credentials still shaken by the 2023 Hamas attacks.

"We are very afraid," said Aysha Hassan, a Palestinian woman who lives in one of three besieged homes in the village, speaking to Reuters by phone.

"There is nothing new. It's been like this for six days...the settlers are still here."

Hassan said she had seen settlers below the house in the early hours of the morning and shared videos with Reuters showing groups of settlers wandering underneath her home that she said she had taken from her window.

The United Nations has said some 15 Palestinians, including two children, were trapped inside their homes with no water or electricity.

Footage shot by a Palestinian resident trapped in another of the besieged homes and obtained by Reuters showed seven settlers outside, standing near a blue tent. One is seen throwing stones toward the nearby village, as another arrives with chairs.

Israeli army vehicles and soldiers later arrive and the tent is seen collapsed on the ground.

"Israeli civilians erected a tent in the Qusra area, and army soldiers operated to remove it while protecting the local residents," the Israeli military said in a statement, a day after dozens of troops were sent into Qusra and occupied several village homes.

Netanyahu's government, the most right-wing in Israeli history, has spearheaded a rapid expansion of settlements in the West Bank, territory captured by Israel in a 1967 war. Israel has established dozens of new settlements and settler outposts in the area.

Rights groups say that settlers have been trying to seize properties on the outskirts of Qusra and neighbouring Jalud as part of a strategy to seize the land between them and join it up with settler outposts to the south and larger settlements to the west.

Arab World

Jared Kushner to Visit Israel and Egypt Next Week with Board of Peace Officials to Talk Gaza

Trump envoy Jared Kushner at the Lake Lucerne Summit at the Buergenstock resort in Obbuergen, near Lucerne, Switzerland, Sunday, June 21, 2026. (Urs Flueeler, Pool Photo via AP)
Trump envoy Jared Kushner at the Lake Lucerne Summit at the Buergenstock resort in Obbuergen, near Lucerne, Switzerland, Sunday, June 21, 2026. (Urs Flueeler, Pool Photo via AP)
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Jared Kushner to Visit Israel and Egypt Next Week with Board of Peace Officials to Talk Gaza

Trump envoy Jared Kushner at the Lake Lucerne Summit at the Buergenstock resort in Obbuergen, near Lucerne, Switzerland, Sunday, June 21, 2026. (Urs Flueeler, Pool Photo via AP)
Trump envoy Jared Kushner at the Lake Lucerne Summit at the Buergenstock resort in Obbuergen, near Lucerne, Switzerland, Sunday, June 21, 2026. (Urs Flueeler, Pool Photo via AP)

President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and negotiator Jared Kushner will travel to the Middle East next week to try to advance plans for an end to the conflict in Gaza after a deal recently announced by the Trump administration ran into Israeli opposition.

An official with the Board of Peace, the body Trump established to oversee the fragile ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war, said Kushner, board high representative Nickolay Mladenov, and executive board member and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair would arrive in Israel on Sunday.

The group will then travel to Cairo, where meetings of a Palestinian technocratic group set to assume control of Gaza under a US-brokered ceasefire deal have been taking place for the past several months, the official said. The trip was reported earlier by Axios.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because planning for details of the trip has not yet been finalized, said the meetings would demonstrate the determination of Trump and the Board of Peace to “see peace, prosperity and sustainable security emerge” in a demilitarized Gaza where Hamas has ceded control to allow reconstruction of the devastated territory.

But Israel has dismissed a recent deal announced by Trump for Hamas to disarm and Israel to withdraw its forces from the Palestinian territory, marking a rare public display of friction with the Trump administration. Though Hamas accepted the plan to decommission its weapons, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in recent days that Israel would not withdraw until Hamas has completely disarmed.

The deal had been seen as a potential breakthrough for ending the war in Gaza. The agreement was based on an October ceasefire that ended major military operations and brought about the release of the remaining hostages held in Gaza, but it has stalled on other fronts.

Arab World

Israeli Settlers Divert Palestinian Water to Fill West Bank Pool

Armed Israeli settlers holding an Israeli flag look on as Palestinian and Israeli activists accompany Palestinian landowners in their property, which is threatened with confiscation by Israeli settlers, in Beit Sahour in the Israeli-occupied West Bank August 14, 2026. REUTERS/Mussa Qawasma
Armed Israeli settlers holding an Israeli flag look on as Palestinian and Israeli activists accompany Palestinian landowners in their property, which is threatened with confiscation by Israeli settlers, in Beit Sahour in the Israeli-occupied West Bank August 14, 2026. REUTERS/Mussa Qawasma
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Israeli Settlers Divert Palestinian Water to Fill West Bank Pool

Armed Israeli settlers holding an Israeli flag look on as Palestinian and Israeli activists accompany Palestinian landowners in their property, which is threatened with confiscation by Israeli settlers, in Beit Sahour in the Israeli-occupied West Bank August 14, 2026. REUTERS/Mussa Qawasma
Armed Israeli settlers holding an Israeli flag look on as Palestinian and Israeli activists accompany Palestinian landowners in their property, which is threatened with confiscation by Israeli settlers, in Beit Sahour in the Israeli-occupied West Bank August 14, 2026. REUTERS/Mussa Qawasma

On a searing summer day, Israeli settlers splashed in a West Bank pool created by siphoning off water that had irrigated Palestinian crops, one of many seizures of water resources across the occupied territory.

The spring served as a lifeline for the nearby village of Fasayil in the fertile Jordan Valley, where Palestinians have relied on it for generations for food, employment and to supplement irregular Israeli supplies to their domestic taps, reported Reuters.

"Our water supply remains cut off to this day, depriving us of the water we depend on for our homes, our livelihoods, and our agricultural land," said Saad Nemer, who farms the land.

Israeli settlers seized his irrigation pipeline in June, channeling the water to an ancient pool in an archaeological site. Soon after, settlers advertised it as an Israeli tourist attraction and Israel's far-right finance minister pledged financial support.

"They are now in the process of developing a recreational park around the pool," Nemer said.

SETTLERS STOP PALESTINIAN VILLAGERS APPROACHING

The seizure of the spring at Fasayil is part of a pattern that Palestinians say is designed to make their lives in the West Bank untenable. Israeli settlers have attacked at least 160 water and sanitation sites across the Palestinian territory ‌this year, United Nations data ‌shows.

Nemer's greenhouses and fields would normally be full of eggplant, zucchini and watermelons, but without water he ‌has not been ⁠able to plant ⁠in the scorched land.

"The settlers cutting off our water has caused us losses and has meant that many families will lose their work and their livelihoods," he said.

Nemer said that an employee had been beaten up by settlers and he himself had faced threats for attempting to approach the spring as far back as two years ago.

Yishai Shreiber, 21, an Israeli settler who had come to swim in the pool near Fasayil on an August afternoon, said Palestinians would not now dare approach.

"Now that they see this entire mass of people, all these large groups of Jews coming here to bathe, they are afraid to come here," said Shreiber.

Shreiber said the West Bank belonged to the Jewish people, and that if Palestinians don't want to accept Jewish authority, they should leave.

Nemer showed Reuters a 2025 land ownership document from COGAT, the Israeli military ⁠agency which enforces civilian policy in the occupied territories. He also presented a map drawn for the pre-occupation 1957 registration ‌of his title deeds showing that his land included both the spring and the pool. COGAT and ‌Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich did not respond to requests for comment.

'WATER WAR' IS PART OF ISRAELI WEST BANK TAKEOVER, PALESTINIANS SAY

Israel's far-right coalition government has overseen massive settlement construction that ‌Smotrich says is aimed at burying the idea of a Palestinian state, which has been recognized by more than 150 of 193 UN member states as ‌encompassing the Gaza Strip and West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

The United Nations and most governments consider the settlements to be illegal under international law related to military occupation. Israel seized the West Bank in the 1967 war, but argues the territory is disputed rather than occupied.

Palestinians have experienced a sharp rise in settler violence, and Palestinian field researcher Fares Foqahaa estimated that settlers had now seized control of 95% of springs in the northern Jordan Valley, displacing communities.

In another West Bank village, Qusra, settlers still besieging three homes on Thursday had ‌also cut off their water and electricity.

Adel Yassin, an official with the Palestinian Authority's water authority, said that settlers target water resources as part of a systematic campaign to force Palestinians off their land.

"I see this as a ⁠water war. It is the silent ⁠bullet that kills Palestinians without a sound," he said, referring to the process of making their livelihoods unsustainable.

ISRAELI ARCHAEOLOGIST SAYS SETTLERS ARE DAMAGING THE SITE

In early June, Eliav Libi, a settler leader targeted with sanctions by Canada and other countries, posted a video showing the pool beginning to fill with water.

He and other settlers say the pool belonged to the biblical-era Jewish king Herod. An archaeologist with the Israeli rights group Emek Shaveh, Alon Arad, said the pool's provenance is unclear.

"We see in many cases the use of archaeology ... to create this feeling that the West Bank is exclusively Jewish," Arad said, adding that the settlers were damaging an archaeological site by filling it with water.

Outside the pool, a billboard advertised a 3 million shekel ($1 million) investment from Smotrich, an architect of settler expansion, who said in a Telegram post the money was for the restoration and development of "Herod's Pools".

The pool and the nearby spring were packed with Israeli families swimming and wading in the water. No Palestinians were present.

One of the few natural springs still available to Palestinians is near the city of Nablus at Wadi al-Badhan. In July, families sat at plastic tables placed in shallow streams picnicking with their feet in the running water.

The springs are located close to Nablus' urban center and had until this year rarely faced incursions from settlers.

Hundreds of settlers descended into the springs earlier this summer, sitting at the plastic tables and walking through the pools, five Palestinians said.

Nizam Fares, the owner of a natural spring park in al-Badhan, said people could no longer enjoy visiting the area.

"People have become scared and jumpy. They come and ask if the settlers are coming or not?" he said.