‘Not happy about it’: Trump hits out at Netanyahu over Gaza hospital strike

Warning: Graphic content

An Israeli strike on southern Gaza’s main hospital that has killed at least 20 people has been condemned by the Albanese government as a likely breach of international law, with a senior minister rebuffing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s claim it was a tragic accident.

US President Donald Trump, usually a reliable Netanyahu ally, again appeared to be losing patience with the 22-month war, declaring he was unhappy about the strike and predicting the conflict would end within weeks.

“I’m not happy about it. I don’t want to see it,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked about the hospital strike. “At the same time, we have to end that nightmare.”

Trump said he believed the war was “coming to a head, it’s coming to an end”.

“I think that we will have, I think the next two to three weeks, you’re going to have a pretty good, conclusive, conclusive ending,” he said.

“Right now, they’re talking about Gaza City. They’re always about something. It’s going to get settled. And I’m saying, ‘you better get it settled soon. You have to get it settled soon’.”

Trump demanded a deal to end the war and return the remaining Israeli hostages in July, saying he expected an agreement between Israel and Hamas “within the next week”. But the war has continued, with Netanyahu rejecting a partial deal with Hamas and ordering the Israeli military to prepare to invade Gaza City.

Among the 20 people killed in the Nasser Hospital strike were five journalists, as well as medical staff, rescue workers and patients, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. It was among the deadliest of multiple Israeli strikes that have hit both hospitals and journalists over the course of the war.

Mariam Abu Dagga, 33, a visual journalist who had freelanced for Associated Press and other news outlets since the start of the war, was killed, along with a contractor for Reuters, cameraman Hussam al-Masri.

Al-Jazeera cameraman Mohammed Salama, freelance reporter Moaz Abu Taha and Ahmed Abu Aziz, who wrote for the Britain-based outlet Middle East Eye, were also among the dead. Photographer Hatem Khaled, another Reuters contractor, was wounded, health officials said.

Netanyahu’s office said the strike was a “tragic mishap” and that the military was investigating.

“Israel values the work of journalists, medical staff, and all civilians,” his office said in a statement.

The United Nations secretary-general, along with Britain, France, Canada and others, condemned the attack, which Australian Environment Minister Murray Watt said “appears to be a clear breach of international law”.

“We utterly condemn this action, and it’s yet another outrage in a war that’s gone on too long and cost too many innocent lives,” Watt said. “It’s very clear that targeting or hitting hospitals, health workers and civilians is a breach of international law.”

Asked about Netanyahu’s claim that the strike was a “tragic mishap”, Watt said: “This is not the first time we’ve seen Netanyahu apologise or accept what he calls innocent mistakes or mishaps.

“Every time something like this happens, it costs people’s lives. It’s not acceptable. What we’ll do is continue to work with the rest of the international community to demand a ceasefire, to demand hostages be released, and to demand peace in the Middle East, and that requires some change from Mr Netanyahu.”

UK Foreign Minister David Lammy said he was “horrified” by the hospital strike, while French President Emmanuel Macron described it as “intolerable”.

Hospital hit

Israeli media reported that troops fired two artillery shells at the hospital, targeting what they suspected was a Hamas surveillance camera on the roof. Reporters from different outlets had regularly set up live TV shots at that location.

The first strike hit an upper floor housing operating rooms and doctors’ residences, killing at least two people, according to Zaher al-Waheidi, head of the records department at the Gaza Health Ministry. Minutes later, as journalists and rescue workers in orange vests rushed up an external staircase to the scene, a second missile hit in the same spot, killing another 18.

Around 80 people were wounded, including many in the hospital’s courtyard, al-Waheidi said.

Reuters, which demanded an explanation in a joint letter with AP to Israeli authorities, said it was devastated to learn of the death of al-Masri and injuries to Khaled.

AP said it was shocked and saddened by the death of Abu Dagga, who frequently based herself at Nasser, most recently reporting on the hospital’s doctors struggling to save children from starvation.

“We are doing everything we can to keep our journalists in Gaza safe as they continue to provide crucial eyewitness reporting in difficult and dangerous conditions,” it said.

The military confirmed its troops carried out a strike in the area of Nasser Hospital, adding it “regrets any harm to uninvolved individuals and does not target journalists as such”.

A British doctor who was working on the floor that was hit just after 10am, Gaza time, said the second strike hit before people could start evacuating from the first. They described “just absolute scenes of chaos, disbelief and fear”.

People wounded from the strikes – either directly caught in the blast or hit by debris – entered the ward, leaving trails of blood. Stretchers rushed past visitors searching for loved ones. The chaos hit as the hospital was already overwhelmed, with patients with IV drips lying on the floors in the corridors in stifling heat, they said.

The journalists’ deaths come two weeks after one of Al-Jazeera’s most recognisable faces reporting from Gaza, Anas al-Sharif, was killed alongside four colleagues in a strike on a tent near Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. Israel accused Sharif of being a Hamas cell leader posing as a journalist, a claim rejected by rights advocates, Al-Jazeera and organisations representing journalists.

The Israel-Hamas war has been one of the bloodiest conflicts for media workers, with at least 192 journalists killed in Gaza in the 22-month conflict, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Aside from rare guided tours, Israel has barred international media from covering the war in person. News organisations instead rely largely on Palestinian journalists in Gaza – as well as residents – to show the world what is happening there.

The Foreign Press Association, which represents international media in Israel and the Palestinian territories, called on Israel “to halt its abhorrent practice of targeting journalists”.

The health ministry said on Sunday that at least 62,686 Palestinians had been killed in the war.

with Reuters, AP

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