‘You have blood on your hands’: Israel thrashes WHO after US media reports Al-Shifa hospital was Hamas military base

Israel has gunned for the World Health Organisation for apparently going soft on Hamas, a government spokesperson Wednesday cited US media reports to embarrass the global body.

Israel accused WHO of hoodwinking Hamas’ use of establishments such as the Al Shifa hospital as its command and control centre.

“And the WHO still says nothing. Silence tells terrorists: keep going. Use hospitals as military bases. We’ll turn a blind eye and claim your bases immune to military attack under international law. And when you tell terrorist to keep going, you have blood on your hands,” Israel government spokesperson Eylon Levy posted in X.

And the @WHO still says nothing.

Silence tells terrorists: keep going. Use hospitals as military bases. We’ll turn a blind eye and claim your bases immune to military attack under international law. And when you tell terrorist to keep going, you have blood on your hands. pic.twitter.com/O6IDmw6ayB

— Eylon Levy (@EylonALevy) January 3, 2024

The attack on WHO came in the wake of a report of the New York Times, wherein the publication cited an American intelligence official who claimed that the US continued to believe that the hospital was used by Hamas as command and control centre and for storing arms and ammunition for terror activities.

“US spy agencies believe that Hamas and another Palestinian group fighting Israel used Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza to command forces and hold some hostages, according to new American intelligence declassified on Tuesday, NYT carried Tuesday.

The report added: “A senior US intelligence official said on Tuesday that the American government continued to believe that Hamas used the hospital complex and sites beneath it to exercise command and control activities, store weapons and hold 'at least a few hostages'.”

The Al-Shifa hospital was a focal point of the IDF campaign against Hamas. The sanitisation of the hospital, which Hamas and several global outlets kept claiming was an act of terrorism of Israel that chose to attack a civilian establishment, was kept a high priority by Israel.

The IDF in the process of cleansing the hospital released several videos detailing how the hospital was used for military stores in the tunnels that ran underneath.