From operating rooms to graveyards: 2025, year of targeting doctors, hospitals in Gaza
The year 2025 was anything but ordinary for the health sector in Gaza. It became a year of heavy tolls of assassinations and destruction, with the Israeli enemy army targeting doctors before patients, and operating rooms before bedrooms, in a seemingly systematic policy to deplete the sector of its medical expertise and cripple its ability to save lives.
In July 2025, an Israeli airstrike hit west of Gaza City, targeting not a military site, but an apartment building inhabited by Dr. Marwan Sultan, director of the Indonesian Hospital and one of the most prominent and influential cardiac surgeons in the sector during the war of annihilation. The doctor survived, but the airstrike claimed the lives of several members of his family: his wife, Zikra Nimr al-Sultan (45 years old); his daughter, Lamis (19 years old); his sister, Amna Omar al-Sultan (33 years old); his daughter, Malak Iyad al-Sultan (15 years old); Aisha Imad al-Sultan (25 years old); her brother, Muhammad (28 years old); and Asmaa Judi al-Sultan (37 years old).
Al-Sultan, who took over the management of the Indonesian Hospital after the arrest of its former director, Dr. Ahmed al-Kahlout, during a raid on the hospital in November 2023, continued his work despite repeated threats. This occurred at a time when most hospitals in northern Gaza, including al-Shifa Medical Complex, had been rendered inoperable by bombing, bulldozing, and the blockade.
Al-Sultan’s case was not unique. In September 2025, the Israeli enemy assassinated Dr. Ashraf Muhammad Abu Muhsin, along with his wife and children, after bombing their home in the al-Sabra neighborhood south of Gaza City. Two months earlier, Dr. Ahmed Qandil, a consultant general surgeon, was targeted in a bombing near the al-Samar intersection in the central Gaza Strip.
Qandil was more than just a doctor; he was a prominent figure in Palestinian surgery. He worked at Al-Shifa Hospital, contributing to the development of surgical curricula and techniques before assuming management of its departments. He later became a consultant at the Baptist Hospital. He participated in research published in prestigious medical journals, represented Palestine at international conferences, and was a member of European societies specializing in surgery and emergency medicine.
Mohammed Qandil, one of his relatives, told the newspaper Falastin: “Dr. Ahmed never left the hospital for a single moment during the war. The Israeli enemy army deliberately assassinated him; it was a premeditated assassination operation to eliminate one of Gaza’s most skilled doctors and leave people without treatment.”
He added that his relative was known for performing complex and delicate surgeries and saving lives, making him a direct target, amidst the assassinations of hundreds of doctors in their homes and in hospitals.
In August, the targeting extended to the operating rooms themselves. The enemy army bombed Nasser Medical Complex, targeting the fifth floor of the Yassin building, which resulted in the martyrdom of Dr. Mohammed Al-Habibi while he was on duty.
Ahmed al-Ghoul recounts what happened: “The Israeli enemy targeted the top floor, then waited for the arrival of journalists and civil defense teams before launching a second shell.” In the same attack, journalist Hossam al-Masri was killed instantly.
Al-Ghoul adds: “It was a massacre. I saw paramedics and civilians carrying Dr. al-Habibi and the staff from the operating room, their blood covering them, after the second shell landed in the same spot.”
The targeting wasn’t limited to personnel. Healthcare facilities themselves were under fire throughout the year. In March 2025, Nasser Hospital was bombed, with the internal surgery wing sustaining casualties and extensive damage, according to Doctors Without Borders.
In May, the Gaza European Hospital in Khan Younis was put out of service after an intense bombardment targeted its grounds and surrounding area with nine heavy bombs. This resulted in the cessation of vital specialized services available only there, such as neurosurgery, cardiothoracic surgery, cardiac catheterization, and ophthalmology.
The list of hospitals out of service expanded to include: Dr. Abdul Aziz al-Rantisi Specialized Children’s Hospital, Martyr Abu Yousef al-Najjar Hospital, the Algerian Specialized Hospital, al-Wafa Hospital for Medical Rehabilitation and Specialized Surgery, al-Hayat Specialized Hospital, Martyr Muhammad al-Durrah Children’s Hospital, the Emirati Crescent Hospital, al-Awda Hospital – Nuseirat, Kuwait Specialized Hospital, al-Karama Specialized Hospital, al-Sahaba Medical Complex, the Friends of the Patient Charitable Society Hospital, and al-Helou International Hospital.
In parallel with the bombing, Israel