Hospital

International humanitarian group Médecins Sans Frontières has currently suspended its medical activities in the Nuba Mountains in Sudan after a hospital it runs was bombed this week. An MSF staff member and a patient suffered injuries from the attack on the hospital in Frandala village in South Kordofan, where government troops and rebel forces are fighting. MSF Head of Mission Marc Van der Mullen believes the hospital was deliberately targeted by the Sudanese Air Force to “terrorize the community.” The government, he argued, is fully aware of the hospital’s location and activities.

A rebel field hospital has been attacked in Yemen, northeast of the Yemeni capital of Sanaa. The attack coincided with a demonstration in the capital against its occupation by Shiite militants. According to Yemeni security, a suicide bomber killed and wounded scores of people when he detonated a car laden with explosives into a hospital run by the Shiite Houthi rebel group around 100 miles northeast of the capital of Sanaa.

Intense shelling and aerial assaults in northern and central Iraq have hit hospitals and other medical facilities, some supported by the international medical organisation Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), depriving civilians of much needed medical care. MSF calls upon all parties to the conflict to respect health facilities, to allow medical staff to continue carrying out their work, and to preserve full access to health services.

An urgent letter sent Wednesday night by Physicians for Human Rights calls on the Israel Defense Forces to desist from bombing near the Al Wafa rehabilitation hospital in Gaza City. The letter was sent to Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon after warning missiles hit the hospital last Friday, causing damage to the building.

Reports were received of damage to Al Wafa Rehabilitation Hospital in Sejaiya. According to media reports rockets were stored in a building near the hospital, which was bombed later. Inside the hospital at the time were 17 patients in serious condition (for whom evacuation presents a real danger to their condition), staff and international activists.