Israeli forces are carrying out "an intelligence-based operation" at al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis, the Israel Defense Forces said Wednesday, without giving further details. The IDF said forces are also continuing their raid on al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, which began over a week ago.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin urged Israel to abandon military plans for a ground offensive in Rafah, the southern Gaza city where more than 1 million Palestinians have crowded to escape fighting elsewhere in the enclave.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society, which operates al-Amal Hospital, said Tuesday that the hospital had "stopped working completely." The IDF said forces "evacuated" medical staff and patients from the hospital before troops entered.
The IDF said that it located weapons and apprehended more than 500 people during its raid at al-Shifa Hospital. Humanitarian groups and aid agencies have publicly denounced the raid, citing concerns for doctors and patients.
Also Wednesday, an Israeli strike on a paramedic center in Lebanon's south killed seven members of a local emergency service, Lebanon's National News Agency reported.
The strike in Lebanon injured four civilians and leveled the emergency service center of the Lebanese Ambulance Association in the southern town of Hebbariyeh, National News Agency reported.
The building destroyed in Lebanon was affiliated with al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, a small political party that for a decade had largely been inactive but saw a resurgence after Oct. 7.
The Israel Defense Forces said that fighter jets struck a military compound in Hebbariyeh overnight, saying it killed a "significant" member of al-Jamaa al-Islamiya alongside other members. The Washington Post could not immediately verify this claim.
Hezbollah on Wednesday said the attack "will not go unanswered and unpunished," and later said it had struck two positions in Kiryat Shemona, in northern Israel, with dozens of missiles. Israel's Magen David Adom emergency services said Wednesday that a 25-year-old worker was pronounced dead after being rescued from a building that was hit in Kiryat Shemona.
Two members of al-Jamaa al-Islamiya's military arm, al-Fajr Forces, were killed in an Israeli strike in January that also killed senior Hamas leader Saleh Arouri in a suburb on the edge of Lebanon's capital Beirut. The targeted hit at the time raised fears of a response from Hezbollah, Lebanon's strongest political party and paramilitary group that holds dominion in the targeted suburbs.
On March 10, al-Jamaa al-Islamiya announced three of its leaders had been killed in clashes with Israel in southern Lebanon.
On Tuesday night, hours before the strike on the ambulance center, Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV channel reported that a delegation from the group visited a center belonging to al-Jamaa al-Islamiya to discuss developments in Gaza and Lebanon. It did not say which center the delegation had visited.
Desperate conditions and extreme crowding have rendered Rafah "unrecognizable," with roughly one toilet available for every 850 people and one shower for every 3,600, UNICEF spokesperson James Elder said Tuesday.
"This is a hellish disregard for basic human needs and dignity," he added in a statement, describing the southern Gazan city as a place overtaken by tents for displaced families and where people are sleeping on the streets.
"Neighboring Khan Younis is also unrecognizable, though for a different reason -- it barely exists anymore," Elder said. "In my 20 years with the United Nations, I have never seen such devastation. Just chaos and ruin, with rubble and debris scattered in every single direction."
In Jabalya, a northern Gazan city that Elder said he visited Monday, "tens of thousands of people" gathered in the streets and signaled that they were hungry by putting their hands to their mouths, he said. He denounced the Israeli blockade of goods into Gaza, echoing humanitarian organizations that have criticized Israeli inspectors for slowing down the delivery of goods or for what they characterized as an arbitrary denial of some aid.
"Let's be clear: Lifesaving aid is being obstructed," Elder said. "Lives are being lost. Dignity is being denied."
Daniel Hagari, a spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces, said in a video statement Tuesday that the IDF was working on "coordinating and facilitating a humanitarian effort by land, air and sea" to allow more aid into Gaza, and he denied that Israel was acting as a "bottleneck."
