Egyptian hospital treats Gaza wounded

Source: Agencies  |   2008-12-30  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

EGYPT started taking in a trickle of wounded Palestinians from the Gaza Strip yesterday. An Egyptian official said nine Gazans were hospitalized in Egypt as the Israeli assault on the coastal area continued.

Around mid-afternoon yesterday, ambulances ferried the wounded from Gaza toward the crossing in the border town of Rafah, where over a dozen Egyptian ambulances waited to take over the casualties.

A wounded Palestinian, who lay wrapped in a blanket on a stretcher, was seen being carried from an ambulance that arrived from Gaza into an Egyptian one.

An Egyptian paramedic, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not allowed to talk to the media, said he was told Egypt would take about 20 to 30 Palestinian casualties to the hospital in the Sinai town of El-Arish.

More than 300 Palestinians have been killed and more than 1,000 wounded since Israel launched an air assault on Saturday on the coastal area to root out the militant Hamas.

The Palestinian health minister from the West Bank, Fathi Aboul Mughli, visited the terminal and praised Egyptian, Saudi and Libyan offers to aid the Gazans. "This is an emergency, the situation is so very difficult," he said.

"I've never seen such an attack," he said of the Israeli offensive, adding that there were about 150 cases in the Gaza hospital's intensive care unit who need to be transported.

Tariq al-Mahlawi, Egypt's deputy health minister, said that Egypt had received only nine cases but that the El-Arish hospital has 500 beds equipped and ready to treat the Palestinians.

Earlier yesterday, Egypt allowed trucks with food and medical supplies to pass through the crossing.