GAZA: The father of nine children killed in an Israeli military strike in Gaza over the weekend remains in intensive care, said a doctor on Sunday at the hospital treating him.
Hamdi Al-Najjar, himself a doctor, was at home in Khan Younis with his 10 children when an Israeli air invasion occurred, killing all but one of them.
He was rushed to the nearby Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza, where he is being treated for his injuries. Abdul Aziz Al-Farra, a thoracic surgeon, said Najjar had undergone two operations to stop bleeding in his abdomen and chest and that he sustained other wounds, including to his head.
“May God heal him and help him,” Farra said, speaking by the bedside of an intubated and heavily bandaged Najjar.
According to the BBC, Najjar sustained injuries to his brain, lungs, right arm, and kidney.
Bulgarian doctor Milena Angelova-Chee, who is treating him at Nasser Hospital, told the BBC that his “life remains in danger” and that the hospital is “doing everything we can for him.”
The Israeli military has confirmed it conducted an air invasion on Khan Younis on Friday, but claims it was targeting suspects in a structure that was close to Israeli soldiers.
The military claims it is looking into the “uninvolved civilians” killed.
According to medical officials in Gaza, the nine children were aged between one and 12 years old. The child who survived, a boy named Adam, is in serious but stable condition, according to the hospital.
The BBC reported that doctors say Adam is “doing reasonably well.”
Najjar’s wife, Alaa, also a doctor, was not at home at the time of the strike.
She was treating Palestinians injured in Israel’s more than 20-month war in Gaza against Hamas in the same hospital where her husband and son are receiving care.
Video verified by the BBC and shared by Health Ministry Director Dr Muneer Alboursh showed small charred bodies being lifted from the rubble.
The nine children — Yahya, Rakan, Raslan, Gebran, Eve, Rival, Sayden, Luqman, and Sidra — were aged between just a few months and 12 years, according to the BBC.
“She went to her house and saw her children burned, may God help her,” said Tahani Yahya Al-Najjar of her sister-in-law. “With everything we are going through, only God gives us strength.”
Tahani visited her brother in the hospital on Sunday, whispering to him that she was there: “You are okay, this will pass.”
On Saturday, Ali Al-Najjar said that he rushed to his brother’s house after the strike, which had sparked a fire that threatened to collapse the home, and searched through the rubble. “We started pulling out charred bodies,” he said.
In its statement about the air invasion, the Israeli military defended its actions by claiming Khan Younis was a “dangerous war zone.”
Practically all of Gaza’s more than 2 million Palestinians have been displaced after more than 20 months of war.
Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza, according to international media.
Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war crimes against defenseless civilians in the enclave.
Israel’s invasion of Gaza since October 7 has killed more than 53,000 Palestinians, Gazan health officials say.
Most of them are civilians, including more than 16,500 children under the age of 18, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
