Statement from The Diocese of Jerusalem regarding the multiple attacks on Al-Ahli Hospital on 17 August 2025

The Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East
The Diocese of Jerusalem

18/8/2025

Yesterday morning, Sunday, August 17th at 12:15 am, armed members of a local outlaw band entered the grounds of our Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City, demanding the treatment of one of their wounded gunmen. The medical staff readily complied and treated him promptly and with full respect, as they do with all their patients. Despite this, after doctors discharged him in good health, members of the band proceeded to set on fire the hospital morgue and staff prayer room, meanwhile blocking the hospital entrance to prevent firefighters from entering to extinguish the blaze.

As a result, the fire came dangerously close to tents currently serving as the hospital’s emergency department, forcing terrified doctors and nurses to quickly evacuate their equally alarmed patients. Although the outlaws’ leader subsequently arrived and intervened so that the fire could be extinguished, the two aforementioned sections of the hospital were left severely damaged. 

Once members of this first band all departed and the staff settled-in to resume normal operations, a second group of outlaws stormed into the hospital campus. Its members then began shooting into the air and shouting wildly for the next two hours. This attracted the attention of an IDF drone. Without its operator giving due warning to the staff, the drone fired suddenly into the hospital compound, killing seven and severely wounding five. 

As the owner and manager of this, the oldest and only Christian hospital in Gaza, the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem condemns these multiple attacks and calls upon all parties to cease from making this sacred place of healing into a battleground, contrary to Articles 18 and 19 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Moreover, we implore the Occupying Power to fulfill its duty of protecting ours and other medical facilities in Gaza, as mandated under Article 56 of that same treaty. 

We would like to thank the heads of the local clans and tribes who, later in the day, paid solidarity visits to the hospital, condemning the above acts. As a similar display of solidarity, we invite Christians and all people of goodwill around the world to pray and advocate on behalf of the courageous staff of our hospital—and, indeed, those of all such institutions in the combat zone—that they may continue, without further assaults or disruptions, Christ’s compassionate healing ministry in the very homeland in which our Lord himself served during His earthly life. May

May God have mercy on us all.