Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak admitted that Israel was the one that built the shelters and dug the tunnels under Al-Shifa Hospital 40 or 50 years ago, in an interview on the American CNN channel.

This came in response to the questions of broadcaster Christiane Amanpour, who asked him about Israel's claims that there is a headquarters for the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) under Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza.

Barak answered these questions by saying that it has been known for many years that there are shelters built by Israeli contractors under Al-Shifa Hospital and used as a headquarters for Hamas, and the intersection of several tunnels is part of this system, as he put it.

In response to Barak, Amanpour said: Are you saying that this place was built by Israeli engineers? Did I make a mistake?

Barak replied, "We helped build these shelters probably 40 or 50 years ago (during the periods of occupation control over the former Gaza Strip), to provide more space for hospital operations within the limited area of the university campus."

The World Health Organization announced yesterday, Monday, that its teams had only seen civilians in Al-Shifa Hospital in the Gaza Strip, and that there was no evidence that it was used as a military headquarters by the Hamas movement.

For its part, Hamas said that the Israeli occupation army's statements about using the Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza to detain Israeli prisoners are misleading and false.

The movement added in a statement the day before yesterday, Sunday, in response to the Israeli army spokesman, that these statements aim to cover up the security and military failure of the occupation army.

Siege and storming

At dawn last Wednesday, the Israeli army stormed the Al-Shifa Medical Complex after besieging it for days, as it contains thousands of civilians who were displaced from their homes and hundreds of wounded as a result of the ongoing Israeli bombing of the Gaza Strip.

For 46 days, the Israeli army has been waging a devastating war on Gaza that has left more than 13,300 martyrs - including more than 5,600 children and 3,550 women - as well as more than 31,000 injured, 75% of whom are children and women, according to the government information office in Gaza.

Source: Anadolu Agency