The long trail of displaced people after the evacuation of the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza

Rami Shurrab was stuck in Gaza’s Al-Shifa hospital for 20 days, and arrived in the center of the Strip on Saturday after walking for hours among wounded, displaced and frightened children.

When the neighborhood where he lived in Gaza City was bombed, Rami Sharab (24) took refuge in Gaza’s largest hospital complex with his sister Hanan (22), his brother Fares (11) and his son. her mother (53 years old), because she was convinced that the bombings would not target them.

Like Rami, there were 2,300 people in Al-Shifa hospital before an evacuation operation began on Saturday, according to the United Nations. Patients, wounded, displaced people and doctors were trapped there due to the battles and siege by Israeli tanks.

On the Salah al-Din Road, which crosses the Gaza Strip from north to south, where Rami Sharab turned on his way out, a group of Palestinians is slowly advancing. A man carries his disabled daughter, while another carries his young daughter whose leg was broken.

On one side they are surrounded by warehouses with destroyed roofs, charred cars and electrical cables dangling over ruined streets. On the other hand, armed and helmeted Israeli soldiers observe them in front of armored vehicles, tanks and troop transports.

Children walk barefoot and the elderly lean on sticks. They are surpassed by some rare families who manage to pay 20 or 30 shekels (between 5 and 8 euros) on carts pulled by a donkey or a horse.

Bags, boxes and diapers

Some hoist a white flag made from a piece of cloth and a small piece of wood. Many of them are carrying bags and packages of diapers that have become unavailable or expensive, as well as boxes and blankets.

Their faces show signs of tiredness and anxiety, and sometimes of crying. But Rami Shurrab feels relieved. He says that “around eight in the morning they asked us over a loudspeaker to evacuate within an hour, otherwise they would have bombed the hospital.”

The Israeli army has been besieging the hospital for days, under the pretext that the hospital complex includes a Hamas military base, which the Palestinian movement denies.

He added: “I was one of the first to leave.” “There were shots in the air and artillery bombardment.” For his part, the Israeli army confirmed that it had complied with the hospital administration’s request to “evacuate”.

When the siege began, doctors told Agence France-Presse that Israeli snipers shot anyone who left the hospital. Then the army operations began inside, in the corridors, in the treatment departments and in the offices.

“Hell”

Patients, evacuees and medical staff were questioned and searched, and some were stripped naked, said an Agence France-Presse journalist who remained in the hospital for several days, where he intended to conduct interviews.

“It was hell,” says Rami Sharab, who was beaten. He added: “I stood in the hospital courtyard in my underwear for 5 hours. And all this in the midst of bombing operations.”

The bombing of the Gaza Strip has continued since, according to the Israeli authorities, the Hamas movement killed 1,200 people in Israel on October 7, thus triggering the outbreak of a war which, according to the Ministry, has so far caused the deaths of 12,300 people in Gaza people. of Healthcare in the Hamas government.

For her part, Samia Al-Khatib (45 years old), a resident of Al-Shati camp, says that she, her husband Ayman Al-Khatib and her daughter Maysar (15 years old) left Al-Shifa hospital on Saturday, and they set off to join the rest of the family in Al-Nuseirat camp, 10 kilometers (south).

According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, a third of the population of the northern Gaza Strip has left Gaza, out of 1.5 million people displaced from Gaza, who make up two-thirds of the population.

He added: “We left the hospital towards the sea (west). All the roads were destroyed and had huge holes. I saw many decomposing bodies near the hospital and on the Corniche Road. The scenes were truly terrifying. A real massacre.”