Why does Israel target Palestinian hospitals? Psyops, say analysts

https://aljazeera.com/features/why-does-israel-target-palestinia…

Israeli tanks close in on a Palestinian hospital. Doctors and medical staff are warned that they must leave — with or without patients in need. Artillery assaults follow, even if thousands of people are still inside.

On Monday, it was the turn of the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia, Gaza. At least 12 people have been killed in Israeli attacks on the facility, even as armoured vehicles edge closer and closer to the hospital.

The real reason Israel targets hospitals is different, according to Omar Rahman, a fellow at the Doha-based Middle East Council on Global Affairs. It is a form of psychological warfare, he said.

“Attacking hospitals tells the population that nowhere for [Palestinians] is safe,” Rahman told Al Jazeera, adding that Israel acts with “total impunity”.

Tahani Mustafa, a senior Palestine analyst at the International Crisis Group, said the act of making Palestinians feel unsafe in every facility in the strip is to quell any form of resistance.

“This is part of a longstanding pattern of harassment of medical staff and services, in which Israel demonstrates to Palestinians that no one and no space is safe,” Mustafa told Al Jazeera.

“It is a systematic attempt to intimidate local populations and undermine their will to resist,” she added.

Throughout the war, Israel has targeted a number of ambulances and medical facilities in the West Bank and Gaza, claiming that Palestinian fighters use them to move around and shelter, without providing evidence for these claims, the analyst said.