Israeli bombardment damaged an already crippled major hospital in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday, injuring medical staff and patients, local officials said, a week after Israeli forces withdrew from the complex and detained dozens of people, including medical workers.

The Israelis “continue to bomb and destroy Kamal Adwan Hospital” in Jabaliya, a densely populated city just north of Gaza City, the Gazan health ministry said on Monday, in a statement it titled “a distress call that may be the last”. The bombardment affected all the hospital facilities, caused “many” injuries among medical staff and patients and prevented medical staff from moving between departments to treat their injured colleagues, it said.

The director of Kamal Adwan, Dr Hussam Abu Safiyeh, said in an interview with the Al Jazeera that the hospital had come under continuous shelling for at least three hours on Monday.

“I can’t leave the floor I am in,” he said. “I was told a few of our medical teams have been injured on other floors but no one can reach them,” he added.

Both he and the health ministry said the hospital was targeted directly. It was not clear what kinds of munitions were used.

New York Times News Service