Gaza hospitals flooding with dead bodies as Israel expands ground operation
News Desk :
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would eventually be tried as a war criminal over Israel’s ongoing offensive in the Gaza Strip, while slamming Western countries supporting Israel.
Turkey, which supports a two-state solution to the decades-old conflict, has sharply criticised Israel over its campaign in Gaza, launched in response to militant group Hamas’ rampage on Oct. 7. More than 15,500 people have been killed in the Israeli air and ground attacks, according to Gaza’s health ministry, reports news agencies.
Israeli occupation forces continue to target civilians, including in hospitals across Gaza, “flooding” them with dead bodies, said Gaza’s Health Ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qudra.
He condemned the situation, stressing that the Israeli occupation is “delivery bombing hospitals in Gaza to put them out of service.”
The health official, according to Al Jazeera, also accused Israeli occupation forces of creating a “circle of death.”
Israeli occupation forces have killed at least 800 people since Saturday following the expiration of the humanitarian truce.
In a speech to an Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) committee meeting in Istanbul, Turkish President Erdogan said the Western nations supporting Israel were giving it “unconditional support to kill babies” and were complicit in its crimes, according to Reuters.
“Beyond being a war criminal, Netanyahu, who is the butcher of Gaza right now, will be tried as the butcher of Gaza, just as Milosevic was tried,” Erdogan said, in reference to Yugoslav ex-President Slobodan Milosevic who was tried for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes at a tribunal in The Hague.
“Those who try to skip over the deaths of all those innocent people by using the excuse of Hamas have nothing left to say to humanity,” he added, referring to Western powers, which he said were “blind and deaf”.
Unlike most of its Western allies and some Gulf states, NATO member Turkey does not view Hamas as a terrorist group and hosts some of its members.
Erdogan, whose ruling party has Islamist roots, said a so-called contact group of Muslim countries, which was formed by the OIC and Arab League last month to hold talks on Gaza with Western countries and others, would continue discussions until the fighting in Gaza stopped, but added more must be done.
“We must absolutely evaluate the United Nations Human Rights Council and the International Criminal Court (ICC) within this framework,” he said, adding Israel’s nuclear arsenal must not be forgotten.