Long live Palestine!”
From Sydney to New York, hundreds of thousands of people gathered around the world this weekend to show solidarity with Palestinians and to demand Israel stop its bombardment of the Gaza Strip.
Mohammed Zaqout, director general of hospitals in Gaza, told Al Jazeera: “I categorically deny these false allegations [from the Israeli army] … I am telling you, we were forced to leave by gunpoint.”
He said the Israeli army called the hospital management at 8am [05:00 GMT] and told them to evacuate the complex, the largest hospital in Gaza, within an hour. They were directed to exit along a route where “charred bodies” were strewn across the street, he added.
Ismail al-Thawabta, director general of the government media office in Gaza, said the Israeli army forced out more than 500 wounded people and patients at gunpoint.
“Al-Shifa Hospital has turned into a detention camp, an interrogation centre, a military barracks and mass grave altogether,” he said.
More than 7,000 people, including patients in critical condition and newborn babies fighting for their lives, were sheltered inside al-Shifa.