Israel does not deliberately target hospitals and medics.

Israel's assault on Palestinian healthcare extends beyond targeting hospitals and medics. Through occupation, siege, forced displacement, attacks on essential infrastructure, and the obstruction of humanitarian aid and medical evacuations, Israel has systematically dismantled the conditions necessary for healthcare to function.

Israel's genocide in Gaza has produced one of the most extensive assaults on healthcare in modern history. Since October 2023, every hospital has been destroyed or damaged, while 1,700 Palestinian healthcare workers have been killed. Hundreds more have been injured, detained, or tortured; ambulances attacked; thousands of patients denied life-saving treatment or medical evacuation; and much of Gaza's health infrastructure rendered inoperable. The World Health Organization (WHO) documented 2,028 attacks on healthcare across Gaza and the West Bank between October 2023 and July 2026.

The destruction of Palestinian healthcare predates the 2023 genocide. For decades, Israel has raided hospitals, targeted medics, attacked medical facilities, obstructed ambulances, and restricted medical supplies. Between 2018 and October 2023, WHO documented 1,382 attacks on health care across Gaza and the West Bank.

The attacks on Palestinian healthcare are too numerous to recount. One of the most devastating was the assault on Al-Shifa Hospital, Gaza's largest hospital, whose destruction WHO described as "ripping the heart out of the health system." During the genocide, Israeli forces besieged and raided the hospital, cutting fuel, electricity, food, water, and medical supplies while forcing patients, medical staff, and displaced Palestinians into inhumane conditions. Doctors performed surgeries without anesthesia, premature babies died after incubators lost power, and hundreds were killed. After Israeli forces withdrew, hundreds of bodies were recovered in and around the hospital, including from mass graves, with signs of torture and executions. As the UN concluded, "Shifa has literally become a graveyard."

Dr. Adnan Al-Borsh and Dr. Iyad Al Rantisi, two of Gaza's most senior doctors, both died in Israeli prisons under torture, abuse, and medical neglect. Dr. Husam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, was arrested in December 2024 and has since reported torture, prolonged solitary confinement, and denial of medical care. These are not isolated cases. As of April 2026, Israel continued to detain 83 healthcare workers out of the 446 detained since October 2023. Six healthcare workers have died in Israeli detention, and their bodies remain withheld. These cases illustrate the systematic targeting of those responsible for saving lives.

By destroying Palestinian healthcare, Israel transformed survivable injuries and treatable illnesses into death sentences. Palestinians died because hospitals were deprived of life-saving medical resources. Premature babies died after incubators lost power, cancer treatments stopped, and chronic diseases went untreated. WHO warned that attacks on healthcare caused "unnecessary deaths, infected wounds and unnecessary amputations."

Hospitals, ambulances, and medical personnel are specially protected under international humanitarian law. For decades, UN bodies, humanitarian agencies, and human rights organizations have documented systematic attacks on Palestinian healthcare. UN experts have described the targeted destruction of Gaza's healthcare system as "medicide," while the UN Commission of Inquiry concluded that it amounts to war crimes and the crime against humanity of extermination.