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Israel-Gaza live updates: 3 premature babies die at Al-Shifa Hospital, doctor says

The hospital has been treating thousands of wounded people.

Thousands of people have died and thousands more have been injured since the militant group Hamas launched an unprecedented surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7 and Israel retaliated with a bombing campaign and total siege of the neighboring Gaza Strip, leaving the region on the verge of all-out war.

Click here for updates from previous days.


What we know about the conflict

The latest outbreak of war between Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that governs the Gaza Strip, has passed the four-month mark.

In the Gaza Strip, at least 30,228 people have been killed and 71,377 others have been wounded by Israeli forces since Oct. 7, according to Gaza's Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health.

In Israel, at least 1,200 people have been killed and 6,900 others have been injured by Hamas and other Palestinian militants since Oct. 7, according to the Israel Defense Forces.

There has also been a surge in violence in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Israeli forces have killed at least 395 people in the territory since Oct. 7, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.

The ongoing war began after Hamas-led militants launched an unprecedented incursion into southern Israel from neighboring Gaza via land, sea and air. Scores of people were killed while more than 200 others were taken hostage, according to Israeli authorities. The Israeli military subsequently launched retaliatory airstrikes followed by a ground invasion of Gaza, a 140-square-mile territory where more than 2 million Palestinians have lived under a blockade imposed by Israel and supported by Egypt since Hamas came to power in 2007. Gaza, unlike Israel, has no air raid sirens or bomb shelters.


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Surgeon at Al Shifa hospital gives update

Dr. Ahmed Mokhallalati, the chief plastic surgeon at Al Shifa hospital in Gaza, told ABC News that he is unwilling to leave his scores of burn patients and stayed behind with the some 2,000 people left in the hospital complex and about 500 patients.

Mokhallalati said the hospital is virtually cut off because no one can get in -- they only received two or three patients on Saturday.

But despite having hundreds of burn patients, Mokhallalati doesn’t have much to do because they have only enough power for a single outlet to work. They use it in a clinic which has become the only operating room, because the real ORs require more power.

Mokhallalati said only about 15-20% of the hospital staff remain.

He also said there are some 40 infants in the neonatal units and 60 or so patients on ventilators, who he and the hospital administrators say will die once the generator fuel runs out.

The Israeli military’s civil coordinator said in a video statement Saturday that the eastern exit to the hospital is open, and that people are free to leave. But the images the Israeli military released from inside Gaza show that much of Gaza City and it’s outlying neighborhoods are flattened.

-ABC News' Matt Gutman and Sohel Uddin


Hezbollah claims responsibility for 2 attacks on Israel

Hezbollah issued two statements claiming two attacks on Israel amid daily clashes between Hezbollah and Israel forces along Lebanon’s southern border.

For the first time since the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks, the Israel Defense Forces said it carried-out a strike 40 km past its northern border into Lebanon, hitting a truck in Zahrani.

For now, this is contained within the the Blue Line, the UN-defined demarcation line between the two countries. As the fighting continues between Hamas and Israel and casualties mount up, the potential for escalation increases.

All of this is happening ahead of the commemoration of Hezbollah’s Martyr Day and another speech by Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrullah, his second of the conflict.


ICRC chief surgeon in Gaza: 'Relentless' stream of burn victims

Dr. Tom Potokar, the International Committee of the Red Cross' chief surgeon who is currently working in the European Gaza Hospital, detailed the challenges they are facing in a phone interview with ABC News Live on Friday.

Potokar, who specializes in burn treatments, said they have seen "many, many" burn cases, adding that the number of burn patients is "relentless" and "not slowing down at all." The patients with burn injuries have been all ages, with the youngest they've seen just 4 months old, he said.

"A lot of them have burns involving the face as well, and the limbs," Potokar said. "These could be quite deep burns, as I say, so will lead to significant scarring potentially in the future if they actually survive."

Potokar, who has been a war surgeon in Gaza before, said the damage is "far, far" worse and in a "completely different stratosphere from how I've ever come across it before."

He said the way they are treating burns is "not ideal" under the current circumstances due to limited medical supplies.

"The way we're treating burns is really stepping back 40, 50 years," he said.

-ABC News' Josh Ascher, Kelly Johnstone, Casey McShea and Michelle Stoddart


IDF denies strike at Gaza hospital

The Israel Defense Forces denied carrying out a strike that hit an outpatient clinic at Gaza's Al-Shifa hospital Friday morning, stating it was a "misfired projectile launched by terrorist organizations inside the Gaza Strip."

There were two incidents at the hospital Friday morning, according to videos verified by ABC News. In one incident, a shell hit the refugee encampment outside of the hospital entrance. In the second incident, a strike hit the outpatient clinic where people were sheltering.

The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry blamed the Israeli military for the strike that hit the outpatient clinic.


Netanyahu to ABC's Muir: 'No cease-fire' without release of hostages

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has once again rejected the idea of a cease-fire in Gaza unless hostages are released, speaking in an exclusive interview with ABC News "World News Tonight" anchor David Muir.

President Joe Biden and top administration officials have been pressuring Israel for temporary "humanitarian" pauses in the fighting so more aid can enter Gaza and more civilians can escape the fighting in the Palestinian territory.

Biden and Netanyahu discussed the matter as recently as Monday, according to the White House, though no apparent agreement was reached.

In the interview, Muir pressed Netanyahu on the Biden administration's calls for humanitarian pauses in Gaza as the civilian death toll climbs; efforts to release the hostages; whether Netanyahu bears responsibility for the intelligence failures; who governs Gaza when the war is over, and more.

"What they're proposing is a humanitarian pause, there will be no pause?" Muir asked Netanyahu.

"Well, there'll be no cease-fire, general cease-fire, in Gaza without the release of our hostages," Netanyahu responded. "As far as tactical little pauses, an hour here, an hour there. We've had them before, I suppose, will check the circumstances in order to enable goods, humanitarian goods to come in, or our hostages, individual hostages to leave. But I don't think there's going to be a general cease-fire."

An extended version of the interview, Netanyahu's first with U.S. media since the war began on Oct. 7, will air Monday on ABC News "World News Tonight" at 6:30 p.m. ET.