This is the moment a BBC journalist broke down in tears while reporting from inside a hospital in Gaza.
The BBC’s Arab reporter Adnan El-Bursh fell to his knees after seeing dozens of friends and neighbors among the dead as Israel bombed the settlement in retaliation for a deadly rampage by Hamas.
He described the situation at Al-Shifa Hospital, the largest medical facility in the 25-mile strip, as traumatic with ‘bodies everywhere’. In one segment, a young girl with a bloody face sits upright in a hospital bed, crying and covered in dust, while a doctor amputates her legs. Al-Bursh says that she has lost her home and her relatives have been killed.
Speaking to the camera at the end of his report, El-Bursh admits: “I’ve seen things I can never see.
The BBC’s Arab correspondent, Adnan El-Bursh, reported on the desperate plight of civilians as Israel bombed Gaza for the sixth consecutive night.
Mr. Al-Bursh cried after seeing the situation at Al-Shifa Hospital
His cameraman Mahmoud also cried after seeing his friend Malik lying injured
“Here at Al-Shifa Hospital, bodies were lying everywhere. The wounded scream for help, you can never forget these sounds. Among the dead and wounded, my cameraman Mahmud saw his friend Malik.
“Malik managed to survive, but his family did not.
“This is my local hospital. Inside are my friends, my neighbors, this is my community. Today has been one of the hardest days of my career.
“I have seen things that I can never see.”
Israel has bombed Gaza in retaliation for a Hamas attack on southern Israeli cities that killed at least 1,300 people this week.
But at least 1,500 Palestinians have been killed in the bombing campaigns, and Israel has also traded blows with Lebanon’s Hezbollah group.
Human Rights Watch said it verified videos taken in Lebanon on October 10 and Gaza on October 11 that showed “multiple aerial explosions of white phosphorus fired by artillery over the port of Gaza City and two rural locations along the Israel-Lebanon border.” .
White phosphorus munitions can be legally used on battlefields to make smoke screens, generate illumination, mark targets, or burn bunkers and buildings.
Because it has legal uses, white phosphorus is not banned as a chemical weapon under international conventions – but it can cause serious burns and start fires.
White phosphorus is considered an incendiary weapon under Protocol III of the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons, which prohibits the use of incendiary weapons against military targets located among civilians, although Israel has not signed it and is not bound by it.
“White phosphorus is unlawfully indiscriminate when bursting into the air in populated urban areas, where it can burn houses and cause terrible harm to civilians,” Human Rights Watch said Thursday.
Human Rights Watch on Thursday accused Israel of using white phosphorus munitions in its military operations in Gaza and Lebanon.
Human Rights Watch said it verified videos taken in Lebanon on October 10 and Gaza on October 11 that showed “multiple aerial explosions of white phosphorus fired by artillery over the port of Gaza City and two rural locations along the Israel-Lebanon border “.
White phosphorus munitions can be legally used on battlefields to make smoke screens, generate illumination, mark targets or burn bunkers and buildings – but they can cause serious burns and fires, with white phosphorus armed that has a devastating effect.
Israeli occupation planes drop white phosphorus bombs west of Gaza City on October 11, 2023 in Gaza City, Gaza
A fireball explodes from an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City on October 12
Israeli tanks move near the Gaza border as the Israeli army deploys military vehicles around the Gaza Strip, Israel on October 12, 2023
Israeli artillery firing into the Gaza Strip from the border on October 12, 2023
Asked for comment on the allegations, the Israeli military said it was “currently unaware of the use of weapons containing white phosphorus in Gaza.”
He did not comment on the rights watchdog’s claims about their use in Lebanon.
Palestinian television channels have broadcast videos in recent days showing thin plumes of white smoke covering the sky over Gaza, which they say is caused by such munitions.
The Israeli military in 2013 said it was phasing out the white phosphorus smoke munitions used during its 2008-2009 Gaza offensive, which prompted accusations of war crimes from various rights groups.
The military did not say at the time whether it would also review the use of weaponized white phosphorus, which is designed to burn down enemy positions.
This morning, the Israel Defense Forces issued an evacuation order for the estimated 1.1 million people living in the Gaza Strip, giving them 24 hours to leave their homes ahead of what is believed to be an increase in airstrikes or an attack. earthly.
But Hamas has called on Palestinians to stay in their homes.
Hamas’s Authority for Refugee Affairs called on residents of the north of the territory to ‘remain steadfast in your homes and stand firm in the face of this despicable psychological warfare waged by the occupation’.
Palestinians would only be able to flee south into Gaza as Israel has completely sealed off the territory, a narrow strip of land about 25 miles long.
The Israeli military had said it would operate with “significant force” in Gaza in the coming days and is urging civilians to evacuate.
Spokesman Jonathan Conricus said Israeli forces “will make extensive efforts to avoid harming civilians”.
He added: “Understanding that there are civilians here who are not our enemy and we do not want to target them, we are asking them to evacuate.”
Suffering in Gaza has increased with Palestinians desperate for food, fuel and medicine, while the territory’s only power plant was shut down due to fuel shortages. A mortuary is said to have overflowed as bodies arrived faster than relatives could claim.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin will visit on Friday, a day after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in Israel for talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The war has claimed at least 2,800 lives on both sides since Hamas launched an incursion on October 7.
Inas Hamdan, an officer at the UN agency for Palestinian refugees in Gaza City, said: “This is chaos, nobody knows what to do.”
She said all UN staff in Gaza City and northern Gaza had been told to evacuate south to Rafah.
Nebal Farsakh, a spokesman for the Palestinian Red Crescent in Gaza City, claimed there was no way more than a million people could be moved safely within the specified time frame, saying: ‘Forget food, forget electricity, forget fuel. The only concern now is whether … you will live.’
She added: “What will happen to our patients?
“We have wounded, we have elderly people, we have children who are in hospitals.
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Moment BBC reporter breaks down in tears while reporting inside Gaza hospital as he ‘sees things I can never unseen’ amid Israeli bombardment
