EU Commission chief criticizes attack on hospital in Gaza

ANKARA

The president of the EU Commission on Wednesday criticized the attack on a hospital in the Gaza Strip last night which killed hundreds of people.

"There is no excuse for hitting a hospital full of civilians," Ursula von der Leyen said at the EU Parliament's plenary session.

"All facts need to be established and those responsible must be held accountable," she added.

EU foreign policy chief Joseph Borrell also decried the strike on the hospital, stressing that "wars also have rules."

"This bomb explosion in the hospital, which we don't yet know to whom should it be attributed, is another terrible manifestation of what goes on, but war has to be carried out in line with international rules,” he said.

“We've said it in other contexts,” Borrell continued.

“Cutting water supplies and food off from civilian populations isn't in line with the rules of war," he said, referring to Israel’s “total siege” on Gaza, cutting off water, electricity, and food supplies, which last week he pointed out “is against international law.”

He added that Gaza is deprived of water now and that over a quarter of the 3,000 killed in the Gaza Strip so far were children.

More than 500 people were killed in an Israeli airstrike on Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza late Tuesday, a Gaza Health Ministry spokesman told Anadolu.

Footage on social media showed corpses scattered across the hospital grounds.

Thousands of Palestinians were at the hospital when the building came under bombardment, an Anadolu reporter said.

Twelve days into the conflict with resistance group Hamas, Israel's bombardment and blockade of the Gaza Strip continued, with over 1 million people displaced — almost half of Gaza's total population, according to the UN agency for Palestine refugees or UNRWA.

The fighting began on Oct. 7 when Hamas initiated Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, a multi-pronged surprise attack that included a barrage of rocket launches and infiltrations into Israel by land, sea, and air. It said the incursion was in retaliation for the storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and growing violence by Israeli settlers.

The Israeli military then launched Operation Swords of Iron against Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip.