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Experts and analysts say that the massive destruction inflicted by Israeli forces on Al-Shifa Hospital, west of Gaza City, represents part of Israel's systematic plan to displace the population of the Strip, and they believe that the United States of America and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) are partners in the crime.

After two weeks of a massive military operation, Israeli forces withdrew from the largest medical complex in the Gaza Strip and the entire occupied territories after completely destroying it and killing hundreds of civilians and medical personnel working there.

This deliberate destruction of the hospital represents part of the process of turning the entire Gaza Strip into an uninhabitable place by depriving residents of health services until they are forced to emigrate, says the Secretary-General of the Palestinian National Initiative, Dr. Mustafa Barghouti.

New Sabra and Shatila

The attack also represents, according to what Al-Barghouti said during his participation in the program “Gaza... What Next?”, “a hideous revenge against civilians similar to what happened in the Sabra and Shatila massacres (between September 16 and 18, 1982).”

While Israel claims that the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas used the hospital for military operations, in practice it was the one who carried out this act in violation of all international laws, because Chief of Staff Herzi Halevy himself arrived at the hospital and used it as a military headquarters, according to Barghouti.

Despite the ugliness of the crime from a humanitarian and legal perspective, military expert Brigadier General Elias Hanna says that the operation was successful from the Israeli point of view, because it achieved part of its systematic plan to destroy all aspects of life in the Gaza Strip, and “also because the forces would not have been stationed in the place so as not to become a target.” "For resistance."

Also, the statements of the Israeli Chief of Staff about the success of the operation - in Hanna's opinion - "confirm that Al-Shifa is part of a larger plan to divide and destroy the Gaza Strip, and thus control specific areas and displace their residents."

Hanna pointed out that the destruction of hospitals "leads us to say that there is an actual implementation on the ground of the displacement process."

Most importantly - from Hanna's point of view - the destruction of hospitals is neither random nor propaganda, because Israel "is trying to measure certain indicators through these operations, which it says resulted in the killing and capture of hundreds of resistance fighters."

However, this strategy will have disastrous repercussions for Israel in the future, because in practice it was not able to liberate a single prisoner through war and even killed many of them during the operations, in the opinion of the speaker himself.

Destroying competencies before buildings

However, the matter does not stop at the level of destroying buildings to eliminate the necessities of life, but it also extends to the killing of all health personnel and competencies present in the sector, whose compensation requires years longer than those needed to rebuild the buildings, according to the former surgeon at Al-Shifa Hospital, Dr. Ghassan Abu Sitta.

Abu Sitta confirmed that the health system in the Gaza Strip will not return to what it was in the foreseeable future after Israel killed a number of the most prominent medical professionals during this war, the most recent of which is plastic surgeon Ahmed Al-Maqadma and his mother, who refused to leave the hospital some time ago.

Abu Sitta described the assassination of Al-Maqadma and his mother as “punishment for their position during the war.” He also noted that the occupation kidnapped Dr. Bassem Al-Masry from inside the place, completely cutting off news of him, and leaving his young children without a provider.

Crime partners

Regarding the American position on the process of destroying Al-Shifa, Al-Barghouti said that the United States, NATO, and the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Karim Khan, are partners in all the crimes committed by Israel.

According to Barghouti, Israel killed 340 medical personnel in Gaza and arrested others, including the director of Al-Shifa Hospital, Muhammad Abu Salamiya. It also stormed the “Ibn Sina” Hospital in the city of Jenin in the West Bank and killed a wounded man in his bed, without Washington, Europe, or the International Criminal Court taking any action. a step.

Barghouti called for “a global pressure campaign to dismiss Khan and replace him with a man who fulfills the mission of international law,” as he put it.

Abu Sitta supports this opinion by saying that the series of destruction of the necessities of life continues, and the arms shipment that Washington recently sent to Israel “confirms that President Joe Biden, his administration, and the governments of Britain, France, Italy, and Canada are partners in the war of extermination waged by Israel,” considering that “NATO is the one waging the war and it is He is responsible for the crime of Shifa because he is the one who armed, supported and supported Israel.”

The newspaper "Haaretz" had confirmed that the army "creates a killing zone", and that the presence of any military force in any place or any building makes it a "direct killing zone", and thus the indiscriminate killing of everyone who is Palestinian becomes part of the plan, as Hanna says.

In this regard, Al-Barghouti pointed out that the entire vicinity of the hospital “was in a killing circle, as the soldiers burned entire families to death, and left massive destruction in the place, which requires action from South Africa to issue a clear order from the International Court to stop the fighting immediately, because matters have reached To a tolerable stage.

In this regard, Hanna confirmed that there is a clear violation of the Geneva Convention and the Hague Convention, which specifically speaks about hospitals and civilian and military prisoners, adding, "There is evidence that can create an important file to complete what South Africa started at the International Court of Justice."

Source: Al Jazeera