The Director-General of the World Health Organization on Friday denied the accusations leveled against his organization by Israel the previous day of "collusion" with Hamas.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on the “X” platform, “Such false allegations are harmful and can endanger our employees who risk their lives to serve the vulnerable.”

"As a United Nations agency, the World Health Organization is neutral and works for the health and well-being of everyone," he added.

Speaking during a meeting of the World Health Organization’s Executive Board on Thursday, Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, Merav Elon Shahar, accused Hamas of “militarizing the entire civilian area in the Gaza Strip as part of a deliberate strategy... These are irrefutable facts that the World Health Organization has chosen to ignore many times. This is not incompetence, this is collusion."

Israel claims that "Hamas is exploiting the special protection for health facilities in the laws of war to use hospitals to carry out attacks and hide tunnels and weapons," which the movement denies.

The Israeli ambassador said, "The World Health Organization was aware that hostages were being held in hospitals and that 'terrorists' were active there."

She went on to say, "Even when we presented concrete evidence of what was going on underground, above ground, weapons, and public headquarters, the World Health Organization chose to look away, putting at risk the very people it was supposed to protect."

In response to a question in this regard on December 21 during a press conference, Richard Peppercorn, the representative of the Health Organization in the occupied Palestinian territories, said that the organization “is unable to verify how each hospital is used.”

He stressed, "The role of the World Health Organization is to monitor, analyze, and submit reports, and we are not an investigative organization."

During the Executive Committee meeting yesterday, Thursday, Dr. Tedros was on the verge of tears when he spoke about the situation in Gaza.