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WHO demands Israel release Gaza hospital director; Hamas reports 27 killed overnight

WHO’s chief has called for the immediate release of the director of a Gaza hospital, held by Israel’s military following a raid, as the death toll soars past 45,000. Follow updates.

Calls for Israel to release director of Gaza’s Kamal Adwan Hospital

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said that 27 people were killed in the Palestinian territory in the past 24 hours, taking the overall death toll of the war to 45,541.

The ministry also said in a statement that at least 108,338 people had been wounded in more than 14 months of war between Israel and Hamas, triggered by the Palestinian group’s October 7, 2023 attack.

It comes as the WHO chief called for the immediate release of Hossam Abu Safiyeh, director of Gaza’s Kamal Adwan Hospital, who is being held by Israel’s military following a major raid on the facility.

A man shouts as he pulls a survivor from the rubble of a building following an Israeli strike near the Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahia, in the northern Gaza Strip. Picture: AFP
A man shouts as he pulls a survivor from the rubble of a building following an Israeli strike near the Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahia, in the northern Gaza Strip. Picture: AFP
Palestinian children, displaced from their homes, smile for a picture. Israeli forces detained the director of a hospital in the north, which the World Health Organization said was put out of service by an Israeli raid. Picture: AFP
Palestinian children, displaced from their homes, smile for a picture. Israeli forces detained the director of a hospital in the north, which the World Health Organization said was put out of service by an Israeli raid. Picture: AFP

The weekend assault on Kamal Adwan in Beit Lahia left northern Gaza’s last major health facility out of service and emptied of patients, the World Health Organization said.

“Hospitals in Gaza have once again become battlegrounds and the health system is under severe threat,” WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X.

“Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza is out of service following the raid, forced patient and staff evacuation and the detention of its director. His whereabouts are unknown. We call for his immediate release.”

Palestinians injured in Israeli bombardment of the Beit Lahia Project area await treatment at the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip. Picture: AFP
Palestinians injured in Israeli bombardment of the Beit Lahia Project area await treatment at the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip. Picture: AFP

Tedros said the patients in critical condition at Kamal Adwan had been moved to the Indonesian Hospital, “which is itself out of function”.

“We urge Israel to ensure their health care needs and rights are upheld.”

“We repeat: stop attacks on hospitals. People in Gaza need access to health care.

Israel alleges the hospital is a "key stronghold for terrorist organisations".

FOLLOW UPDATES BELOW:

BABY DIES FROM COLD; MORE GAZA KIDS DEAD

Gaza health officials said that a 20-day-old baby has died from “severe cold” as the war-ravaged Palestinian territory grapples with winter weather.

Jumaa al-Batran died from the cold, while his twin brother remains in the intensive care unit at a local hospital, the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory said in a statement.

Marwan al-Hamas, head of field hospitals in Gaza, confirmed the death. He said it brought to five the total number of children “who have died due to severe cold” in recent weeks.

“There is no electricity. The water is cold and there is no gas, heating or food,” said Yahya al-Batran, the father of the child.

“My children are dying in front of my eyes and nobody cares. Jumaa has died and I fear that his brother Ali may follow.” Yahya al-Batran said he and his wife were living in a tattered tent in the city of Deir el-Balah in central Gaza.

Tents housing displaced Palestinians in the central Gaza Strip on December 29, 2024. Picture: AFP
Tents housing displaced Palestinians in the central Gaza Strip on December 29, 2024. Picture: AFP

Hundreds of thousands of displaced people are crammed into unsuitable tents, most of which were hastily set up in Deir el-Balah and in the southern areas of Khan Yunis and Rafah.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said an air strike hit a hospital on Sunday, killing at least seven people.

Israel’s military said it had carried out a “precise strike” targeting members of Hamas’s aerial defence unit operating from a “command and control centre in a building that served in the past as the Al-Wafaa hospital”.

Damage at the Al-Wafaa Hospital in central Gaza Strip on December 29, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. Picture: AFP
Damage at the Al-Wafaa Hospital in central Gaza Strip on December 29, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. Picture: AFP

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said the hospital was still in use. “The Al-Wafaa Hospital is partially operational, providing care to patients with physical disabilities,” the ministry’s director general, Munir al-Barsh, told AFP.

“The hospital had been rehabilitated and was getting ready to receive patients. Had it not been targeted by Israeli shelling today, it would have been ready to fully reopen in the next few days,” he said.

The strike on Al-Wafaa Hospital came a day after the military ended a raid on Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, an assault the World Health Organization reported left the facility empty of patients and staff.

The military also detained the hospital’s chief, Hossam Abu Safiyeh, saying he was suspected of being a Hamas militant.

Israel detains Dr Hussam Abu Safia after raiding Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza

NETANYAHU TO UNDERGO MAJOR SURGERY

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will undergo prostate removal surgery on Sunday after being diagnosed with a urinary tract infection last week.

Mr Netanyahu’s office announced the surgery, describing the infection as “stemming from a benign enlargement of his prostate.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the fifth day of testimony in his trial on corruption charges at the district court in Tel Aviv on December 23, 2024. Picture: AFP
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the fifth day of testimony in his trial on corruption charges at the district court in Tel Aviv on December 23, 2024. Picture: AFP

The surgery comes as Netanyahu, 75, leads Israel in multiple conflicts across the Middle East against Iran and its proxy terrorist groups.

GAZA HOSTAGES ABUSED DURING CAPTIVITY: REPORT

An Israeli government report set to be submitted to the UN says that hostages, including children, freed last year from Gaza endured physical and sexual abuse during their captivity.

The report from the Israeli health ministry, which it said was based on testimonies from released captives, details incidents of individuals being burned, beaten and deliberately starved by their Hamas captors.

The findings will be presented to Alice Jill Edwards, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, the ministry said in a statement.

The report said that some of the hostages, including children, had been “sexually assaulted or forced to undress, including at gunpoint”.

Women hostages described being “tied to beds while their captors stared at them,” while men also reported severe abuse, the report said.

Yehuda Cohen, father of Israeli hostage Nimrod Cohen, speaks to reporters during a rally calling for action to secure the release of Israeli hostages held captive since October 7 2023. Picture: Jack Guez/AFP
Yehuda Cohen, father of Israeli hostage Nimrod Cohen, speaks to reporters during a rally calling for action to secure the release of Israeli hostages held captive since October 7 2023. Picture: Jack Guez/AFP

Israel has previously presented reports and released testimonies from hostages detailing sexual abuses in captivity, which Hamas has consistently denied.

Some former hostages have spoken publicly. Earlier this year, freed hostage Amit Soussana told the New York Times of how she was forced to perform “a sexual act” on one of her captors.

The latest report from the health ministry also said that male captives “endured severe physical abuse, including continuous starvation, beatings, burns with galvanised iron … and being denied access to the bathroom, which forced them to defecate on themselves”.

Amit Soussana who was taken hostage by Hamas during the October 7 attack on Israel is escorted by members of the International Red Cross on November 30, 2023. Picture: Hamas Military Wing
Amit Soussana who was taken hostage by Hamas during the October 7 attack on Israel is escorted by members of the International Red Cross on November 30, 2023. Picture: Hamas Military Wing

During their attack on Israel on October 7 last year, Hamas-led militants seized 251 hostages.

Eighty Israelis were among 105 captives released during a one-week truce late last year, the only truce in over 14 months of war between Israel and Hamas that began after the attack.

Ninety-six hostages remain in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

In recent weeks, progress has been reported in efforts to reach a new deal that would release the remaining hostages and bring a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.

“This critical report underscores the urgent need to release all hostages as swiftly as possible,” Moshe Bar-Siman-Tov, the health ministry’s director general, said.

ISRAEL IS ‘JUST GETTING STARTED’ IN HOUTHI REBEL FIGHT

Israel will not back down in its quest to protect its people from the aggression of Houthi rebels says Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after the World Health Organisation boss inadvertently got caught up in an air strike.

The Israeli Defence Force pummelled Sanaa’s international airport and other targets in Yemen, leaving three people dead, a day after Iran-backed Houthi rebels fired yet another missile at the Jewish state.

The control tower was gutted due to Israeli strikes on Sanaa airport. Picture: Al-Masirah TV/AFP
The control tower was gutted due to Israeli strikes on Sanaa airport. Picture: Al-Masirah TV/AFP

Mr Netanyahu appeared on Israel’s Channel 14 where he confirmed this would not be the last time they pursued the rebels in Yemen.

“We’re just getting started with them,” Mr Netanyahu said.

“We won’t allow them (to attack Israel) these days, today and any other day.

“We will strike them to the bitter end until they learn.

“Hamas learned, Hezbollah learned, and Syria learned. The Houthis will learn too.”

Buildings burn following Israeli strikes on the Ras Kutaib power station in Hodeida. Picture: Al-Masirah TV/AFP
Buildings burn following Israeli strikes on the Ras Kutaib power station in Hodeida. Picture: Al-Masirah TV/AFP

Mr Netanyahu warned that Israel’s strikes would “continue until the job is done”.

“We are determined to cut this branch of terrorism from the Iranian axis of evil,” he said in a separate video statement.

His defence minister Israel Katz said Israel would “hunt down all the Houthi leaders … No one will be able to escape us”.

Tedros, who was in Yemen to seek the release of detained UN staff and assess the humanitarian situation in war-torn Yemen, said he and his team were about to board their flight when “the airport came under aerial bombardment”.

A screen grab shows travellers rushing in panic out of Sanaa international airport after it was hit by an Israeli strike. Picture: AFP
A screen grab shows travellers rushing in panic out of Sanaa international airport after it was hit by an Israeli strike. Picture: AFP

He said the air traffic control tower, departure lounge and runway were damaged in the strike.

The rebel-held capital’s airport was struck by “more than six” attacks with raids also targeting the adjacent Al-Dailami air base, a witness told AFP.

A series of strikes were also fired at a power station in Hodeida, a witness and the Iran-backed Houthis’ official Al-Masirah TV station said.

People duck for cover as Sanaa international airport in Yemen was hit by an Israeli strike. Picture: AFP
People duck for cover as Sanaa international airport in Yemen was hit by an Israeli strike. Picture: AFP

Two people died and 11 were wounded at the rebel-held capital’s airport, and one person was killed and three were missing at Ras Issa port, Houthi statements said.

Houthi spokesperson Mohammed Abdulsalam called the strikes, a day after the Houthis fired a missile and two drones at Israel, “a Zionist crime against all the Yemeni people”.

The Israeli military said its “fighter jets conducted intelligence-based strikes on military targets belonging to the Houthi terrorist regime”.

The IDF said it struck Yemen after the Houthis recent repeated ballistic missile and drone attacks on Israel. Picture: AFP
The IDF said it struck Yemen after the Houthis recent repeated ballistic missile and drone attacks on Israel. Picture: AFP

Sources in Yemen also reported strikes on the port city of Hodeida.

Multiple air raids hit several targets in rebel-held areas of Yemen witnesses and the Iran-backed Houthi rebels said, with their media saying Israel launched the strikes.

The strikes came a day after Yemen fired a ballistic missile and two drones at Israel.

JOURNALISTS KILLED IN GAZA

Five journalists were killed in Gaza in an Israeli air strike, according to a Palestinian TV channel.

A missile hit the journalists’ broadcast truck as it was parked in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, according to a statement from the outlet, Al-Quds Today.

The channel identified the five staffers killed as Faisal Abu Al-Qumsan, Ayman Al-Jadi, Ibrahim Al-Sheikh Khalil, Fadi Hassouna and Mohammed Al-Lada’a.

They were killed “while performing their journalistic and humanitarian duty”, the statement said.

Israel says it struck militants as Gaza says five journalists killed

“We affirm our commitment to continue our resistant media message,” it added.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military said in its own statement it had conducted “a precise strike on a vehicle with an Islamic Jihad terrorist cell inside in the area of Nuseirat”.

“Prior to the strike, numerous steps were taken to mitigate the risk of harming civilians,” it added.

Originally published as WHO demands Israel release Gaza hospital director; Hamas reports 27 killed overnight

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Original URL: https://www.themercury.com.au/news/world/yemen-fires-ballistic-missile-at-israel-as-pm-netanyahu-warns-houthis-of-consequences/news-story/a03141a21607f0a20b6f11874aeb931e