JENIN: A climate of fear pervades a hospital in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin, where patients and doctors are reeling from last month’s deadly raid by Israeli agents disguised as medics.
At the rehabilitation ward at Jenin’s Ibn Sina Hospital, two patients recalled hearing the screams of a nurse as Israeli forces reached the third floor.
“I opened the door and saw a man. I didn’t know they were special forces,” said a patient, a grey hoodie pulled up over his head to conceal his face. “The man was choking the nurse with his hand and hit her with the butt of his gun.”
A nurse shows the hole made by a bullet in a mattress at Ibn Sina hospital in Jenin in the occupied West Bank, on February 8, 2024. (AFP)
His account matched that of an elderly patient, who recalled hearing shouting while he stayed put in his room.
Neither knew that through a sky-blue door just meters away, the Israeli unit shot dead three Palestinians, all militants, including a paraplegic patient hospitalized for months. “It’s toughest at night,” said the patient, who had been shouted at by the undercover agents to shut his door during the assault. All but one person in the hospital spoke on condition of anonymity, as they were worried about their safety.
BACKGROUND
The World Health Organization said it was ‘appalled’ over the Israeli undercover operation.
Across the ward, room 376 had been scrubbed clean and lay empty.
Only on closer inspection were bullet holes visible in the abandoned hospital bed and an adjacent chair where the young men had been shot.
One of the staffers showed photos on his phone of a bullet, another of flesh left on the bed in the January 30 raid.
A medic said he was approached by a man dressed as a doctor, who spoke perfect Arabic and showed the ID pinned to his chest before asking him to unlock room 376.
Inside were militants Basel Ghazawi — unable to walk after being shot in October — his brother Muhammad Ghazawi and friend Muhammad Jalamnah.
The Israeli military justified the killing inside a medical facility, which are granted special protection under international law, by saying the trio were “terrorists” who were “hiding” in the hospital.
