UN agency: 40 percent of Gaza hospitals not functioning

A United Nations agency warned that 40 percent of hospitals in the Gaza Strip are no longer functioning as violence continues in the territory.

The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs announced Tuesday that 40 percent of hospitals in Gaza with inpatient capacities have stopped functioning since the start of the conflict Oct. 7. Its latest update also said 71 percent of all primary care facilities in Gaza have shut down due to damage or a lack of fuel.

“Deteriorating conditions and overcrowding in UN facilities in #Gaza create health and safety risks for the hundreds of thousands of people seeking shelter,” the agency wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “Amid worsening sanitary conditions, thousands of disease cases have been reported.”

Gaza has been bombarded by Israeli airstrikes since the militant group Hamas launched an attack on Israel early last month. The airstrikes, combined with a lack of food, water, fuel and medical supplies, have prompted humanitarian groups and world leaders to issue global warnings of a growing humanitarian crisis in Gaza. 

The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry said the Palestinian death toll passed 10,300, including more than 4,200 children, as of Tuesday. Thousands more have been injured in the fighting, the ministry said. 

The U.N. agency said the main electricity generators at Shifa Hospital in Gaza City and the Indonesian Hospital in North Gaza have stopped operating due to the lack of fuel. It also pointed out that strikes on the areas surrounding four hospitals in Gaza City on Sunday killed eight people.

The U.S. has been pressing Israel to agree to a humanitarian pause in its aerial strikes on Gaza to get hostages out and potentially send in more humanitarian aid for the region, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hasn’t agreed to one yet. The Israeli prime minister said Monday there will be “no cease-fire” without the release of the hostages, but he may be open to “tactical pauses” in the fighting.

More than 1,400 Israelis were killed in the initial attacks Oct. 7, and more than 200 hostages were taken hostage by Hamas. Since then, only a handful of hostages have been released.