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IDF says it is carrying precise mission at Gaza hospital, 'not raiding' it

The Israeli military began storming the Al-Shifa hospital in the early hours of Wednesday, claiming that the facility acts as a cover-up for the main headquarters of the HAMAS movement

TEL AVIV, November 15. /TASS/. An official spokesman of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Peter Lerner, told CNN on Wednesday that the Israeli military was carrying out a precise mission at the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza, and "not raiding" the facility, the The Jerusalem Post newspaper said.

"We are not raiding the hospital, but targeting a specific place," the newspaper quoted him as saying.

In his words, the IDF is carrying out a local and precise mission, "to possibly reach a place where we will defeat Hamas and release hostages."

The Israeli military began storming the Al-Shifa hospital in the early hours of Wednesday, claiming that the facility acts as a cover-up for the main headquarters of the HAMAS movement. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) also claimed that that the medical facility houses an entrance to a network of underground bunkers and tunnels, where around 200 radicals are hiding. It is also believed that an unknown number of Israeli hostages may be kept in these tunnels.

The situation in the Middle East sharply escalated following an incursion of Hamas militants from the Gaza Strip into Israel on October 7, accompanied by killings of residents of Israeli settlements near the border and taking more than 200 hostages, including children, women and elderly people. Hamas regards the attack as a response to Israeli actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on Jerusalem's Temple Mount. Israel has declared a complete siege of the Gaza Strip and has started delivering strikes on that area and parts of Lebanon and Syria. Clashes are also taking place in the West Bank.