Al-Awda Hospital in Gaza is on the verge of halting its services due to fuel depletion

Al-Awda Hospital in the Nuseirat camp (central Gaza Strip) is on the verge of halting most of its services today, Thursday, due to fuel depletion, as confirmed by the general director of the Al-Awda Health and Community Association, Dr. Raafat Al-Majdalawi.

The hospital is struggling, like other hospitals in Gaza, to manage the fuel and fuel crisis since the beginning of the war, but Al-Majdalawi said they are about to halt most services later today, due to the unfair way diesel is distributed to hospitals.

Al-Awda Hospital provides surgical, maternity, pediatric clinical care, and emergency services, and it needs 2,600 liters of fuel daily, but it only receives a maximum of 1,000 liters, according to Al-Majdalawi.

The occupation has been providing fuel to national hospitals daily in quantities that do not allow for reserving part of it for emergency cases as supposed, while foreign hospitals are given all the fuel they need, according to Al-Majdalawi.

The Palestinian doctor described this method of fuel distribution as unfair, saying it is suspicious and raises questions, as it reflects a desire to disrupt local and national hospitals in favor of those managed by foreign teams.

Al-Awda Hospital serves thousands of residents daily, and it will face a difficult, complex, or even catastrophic reality if it cannot provide fuel in the coming hours, according to Al-Majdalawi.

It is impossible, according to the spokesperson, to schedule many services such as various types of deliveries, admissions, accidents, injuries, emergencies, and specialized surgical operations.

Currently, the hospital management is making attempts with the rest of the health system components to refer some cases to them, but the reality of these institutions is not better, and the situation may worsen today, tomorrow Friday, or the day after Saturday at most, as Al-Majdalawi said.

Since the start of the war, fuel used to reach hospitals through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), then the task shifted to the World Health Organization, and from there to an international institution, but the latter confirmed to the hospitals 10 days ago that it has nothing to provide them with fuel.

The sector is suffering from continuous deterioration due to the acute shortage of staff and specialists, and the malfunction of most necessary medical equipment, while the occupation continues to tighten restrictions on the entry of aid, medical supplies, medicines, and even food.