Israel’s military released security camera footage Sunday it said showed hostages being brought into Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City on October 7 after being kidnapped during Hamas’s attacks on southern Israel, writes arabnews.com.
Al-Shifa hospital has become a focal point for Israel’s subsequent military operations in the Gaza Strip, with the army repeatedly saying Hamas uses it as a base, a claim the military has been under pressure to back up.
The militants and medical staff have denied that a command center is under the hospital.
The first clip, which appears to be time-stamped 10:53 am on October 7, shows a man in shorts and a pale blue shirt being dragged through what looks like an entrance hall by five men, at least three of whom are armed. In the second, seemingly time-stamped 10:55 am, an injured man in underwear is wheeled in on a gurney by seven men, at least four of them armed, as several men in blue hospital scrubs look on.
AFP was not immediately able to verify the footage.
“Here you can see Hamas taking a hostage inside... they’re taking him inside the hospital,” military spokesman Daniel Hagari said, describing the two men as hostages from Nepal and Thailand: “We have not yet located both of these hostages. We do not know where they are”.
The CCTV footage appears to have been shot on the morning that Hamas gunmen began storming southern Israel, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping some 240 others, according to Israeli authorities.