ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s foreign office strongly condemned Israel’s bombardment of a Jordanian field hospital in Gaza on Thursday, joining Arab states in demanding a “thorough investigation” into the incident.
Jordan’s foreign ministry confirmed on Thursday seven staff members were wounded by the Israeli shelling of a Jordanian field hospital in Gaza. The attack drew widespread condemnation from several Arab states including Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Egypt and Kuwait.
Pakistan’s foreign office issued a statement condemning the incident, saying that the “inhumane attack” was the latest in a series of Israel’s assaults on hospitals and medical facilities in Gaza, adding that it constitutes a “war crime” and flagrant violation of international law.
“Pakistan joins the call for a thorough investigation into this barbaric incident and other attacks on medical facilities in Gaza,” the foreign office said.
“And for holding the occupation forces accountable for the war crimes being perpetrated in the occupied Palestinian territories.”
The foreign office called on the international community to intervene to bring an end to Israeli atrocities in Gaza and bring about a cease-fire in the territory.
Israel has launched a war on Gaza since Oct. 7 after Hamas fighters rampaged through southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking some 240 hostages. Israel retaliated by enforcing a strict blockade of the enclave, and carrying out airstrikes and ground attacks that Palestinian officials say have killed around 11,500 people, of which 40 percent are children, with many more dead and buried under the rubble.
Entire generations of Palestinian families in the besieged Gaza Strip have been killed, from great-grandparents to infants only weeks old. Attacks are occurring at a scale never seen in years of conflict, with Israel hitting schools, hospitals, residential areas, mosques and churches, even striking areas in southern Gaza where Israeli forces ordered civilians to flee.
In a statement released earlier today, Thursday, Pakistan’s foreign office called on Israel to be held accountable for “deliberately” targeting mosques, churches and schools sheltering civilians who had been rendered homeless because of Israel’s destruction of their homes.
“By decimating civilian infrastructure and symbols of self-governance, including the Legislative Council, Israel is deliberately making Gaza uninhabitable for its civilian population. Backers of Israel must stop Israel from implementing its plans,” the foreign office said, calling Israel’s attacks “war crimes” and the “ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people.”
Gaza’s biggest hospital, Al Shifa, has become the chief target of the ground incursion by Israeli forces, who say Hamas operations are headquartered in tunnels beneath it. Hamas has denied the accusation as “lies and cheap propaganda.”
Israel has ordered the evacuation of the entire northern half of Gaza, and around two-thirds of its 2.3 million residents are now homeless. On Thursday, Israeli forces dropped leaflets warning Palestinians to flee parts of southern Gaza, signaling a possible expansion of operations to areas where hundreds of thousands of people who heeded earlier evacuation orders are crowded into UN-run shelters and family homes.
Broadening the offensive to the south, where food, water and electricity are increasingly scarce and on which Israel already carries out daily air raids, threatens to worsen an already severe humanitarian crisis in the besieged territory.
