BBC News’s international editor, Jeremy Bowen, has received a voice note from Marwan Abu Saada, a surgeon inside al-Shifa hospital, saying the main intensive care unit has been hit.
Iran’s president, Ebrahim Raisi, has arrived in Saudi Arabia for a summit on Gaza (see earlier post at 07.02), state-affiliated media has reported.
Middle East leaders have called for a ceasefire while warning the conflict risks drawing in other countries, a threat Raisi on Saturday blamed on Washington’s staunch support for Israel, AFP reports.
“The war machine in Gaza belongs to the US,” he said before departing for Riyadh. “The US has prevented the ceasefire in Gaza and is expanding the scope of the war.”
Israel’s bombardment of Gaza has reportedly killed more than 11,000 Palestinians since Hamas militants rampaged through southern Israeli communities on 7 October.
Officials initially said about 1,400 people, mostly civilians, were killed in those attacks, but on Friday that figure was revised down to about 1,200.
“This is the updated number,” the ministry spokesperson Lior Haiat told AFP. “It is due to the fact that there were lot of corpses that were not identified and now we think those belong to terrorists … not Israeli casualties.”
The spokesperson for the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry said that operations in al-Shifa hospital complex, the largest in the enclave, were suspended on Saturday after it ran out of fuel.
“As a result, one newborn baby died inside the incubator, where there are 45 babies,” Ashraf al-Qidra, the spokesperson for the health ministry told Reuters.
Al-Shifa hospital, hit by missiles on Friday, is the largest in the 360sq km Gaza Strip.
In recent weeks, Israel has said Hamas militants have hidden command centres and tunnels beneath it and other hospitals.
Hamas, health authorities and Shifa directors have denied the group is concealing military infrastructure in or under the complex and have said they would welcome an international inspection, according to Reuters.
