The Hamad Hospital, named after His Highness the Father Amir, is the first prosthetic hospital and disability rehab centre in the Gaza Strip. The 100-bed, 12,000-square-metre state-of-the-art facility also offered services to children with hearing impairment or motor disabilities.Qatar proposed the hospital in 2012 when then-Amir HH Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani became the first head of any state to visit Gaza since Hamas took control of the territory in 2007 from the Palestinian Authority (PA). HH Sheikh Hamad pledged more than $400m for infrastructure, housing and relief projects, including the hospital. But a lack of qualified staff and funding prevented Hamas’ health authorities from operating the centre after the building was complete.Israel and Egypt have imposed a blockade on Gaza to isolate Hamas, and the PA has cut back its spending on the territory of two million people to force Hamas into ceding control. Eventually, the Qatar Fund for Development assumed the operational expenses and trained 150 medical staff locally and abroad to run the hospital, allowing for its opening.
At least 212 people, including almost 100 women and children, have been killed in Gaza, in Israeli attacks that started more than a week ago following a flare up of tensions in the region.The bombings near the hospital comes after the Qatar Red Crescent Society's headquarters in Gaza was destroyed in what is being described as a "direct bombardment" by Israeli occupation forces on Monday. On Saturday, an Israeli airstrike targeted and destroyed a high-rise building in Gaza City that housed offices of Al Jazeera, The Associated Press and other media outlets hours after another Israeli air raid on a densely populated refugee camp killed at least 10 Palestinians from an extended family, mostly children.