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HAIFA: Deep underneath the Israeli city of Haifa, medics lined up beds and checked connections in what they said was the world’s biggest subterranean hospital on Thursday, getting ready for the day the conflicts boiling at the borders come to their door.
To the south, Israel’s army was bombarding the Gaza Strip, vowing to wipe out the Hamas militant movement that sent hundreds of gunmen rampaging through Israeli towns on Saturday, killing hundreds of civilians.
To the north, rockets have been coming over the border from Lebanon, and to the northeast, Syria accused Israeli forces on Thursday of launching simultaneous missile strikes on two of its main airports.
All was quiet under Haifa, though sirens later blared above ground – as they had a day earlier when Hamas said it was targeting the port city with an R60 rocket that landed without causing casualties.
“Because now the tension in the north is building, we were asked by the ministry of health to prepare the underground facility,” Dr. Michael Halberthal, director general of the Rambam Health Care Campus that runs the operation, told Reuters.
A total of 2,000 beds have been laid out in the Sammy Ofer Fortified Underground Emergency Hospital on three floors, each of them covering 20,000 square metres or roughly five acres. In peacetime they are parking lots. In war, they house operating theatres, recovery wards.
“The idea is that in the case of emergency … we desert the hospital above us, everybody, the patients, the staff, the equipment, everything is coming down,” said Halberthal.
The gleaming equipment was a world away from the chaos and carnage in Gaza’s medical centres as the Israeli bombardment raged on.
There the Red Cross pleaded on Thursday for fuel to be allowed in to prevent overwhelmed hospitals from “turning into morgues” – only to be told by Israel that there would be no humanitarian exceptions to its siege of the Gaza Strip until all its hostages were freed.
In Haifa, staff put the finishing touches to a medical command and control centre. “In case of military confrontation, everything is protected,” said Halberthal.
To the south, Israel’s army was bombarding the Gaza Strip, vowing to wipe out the Hamas militant movement that sent hundreds of gunmen rampaging through Israeli towns on Saturday, killing hundreds of civilians.
To the north, rockets have been coming over the border from Lebanon, and to the northeast, Syria accused Israeli forces on Thursday of launching simultaneous missile strikes on two of its main airports.
All was quiet under Haifa, though sirens later blared above ground – as they had a day earlier when Hamas said it was targeting the port city with an R60 rocket that landed without causing casualties.
“Because now the tension in the north is building, we were asked by the ministry of health to prepare the underground facility,” Dr. Michael Halberthal, director general of the Rambam Health Care Campus that runs the operation, told Reuters.
A total of 2,000 beds have been laid out in the Sammy Ofer Fortified Underground Emergency Hospital on three floors, each of them covering 20,000 square metres or roughly five acres. In peacetime they are parking lots. In war, they house operating theatres, recovery wards.
“The idea is that in the case of emergency … we desert the hospital above us, everybody, the patients, the staff, the equipment, everything is coming down,” said Halberthal.
The gleaming equipment was a world away from the chaos and carnage in Gaza’s medical centres as the Israeli bombardment raged on.
There the Red Cross pleaded on Thursday for fuel to be allowed in to prevent overwhelmed hospitals from “turning into morgues” – only to be told by Israel that there would be no humanitarian exceptions to its siege of the Gaza Strip until all its hostages were freed.
In Haifa, staff put the finishing touches to a medical command and control centre. “In case of military confrontation, everything is protected,” said Halberthal.
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