Israel said special forces operating inside Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza had captured dozens of fighters belonging to Hamas and other groups -- some of whom took part in the Oct. 7 attacks -- but Gaza health authorities said the incursion into the facility had resulted in the death of four patients.

A nurse tends to premature babies in Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis where the IDF says it has captured dozens of operatives from Hamas and other groups. Gaza's Health Ministry said Friday that 12 people had been killed and 157 injured as a result of Israel's military offensive in the past 24 hours bringing the total casualty number since the Oct. 7 outbreak of hostilities to 28,775 killed and 68,552 injuries.

IDF named three men of dozens it found hiding inside the hospital, two of whom it alleged had admitted participating in Hamas' surprise assault into southern Israel in which 1,200 people were killed and 250 taken hostage, at a briefing late Thursday.

The military said it was compelled to storm the hospital because hostages had previously been held in the complex which continued to serve as a hideout and operating base for members of Hamas and other militant groups.

IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari said one of the men was an ambulance driver who allegedly belonged to Hamas and took part in the Oct. 7 attacks while the second had admitted his involvement. A third man was referred to as a "convicted terrorist" linked to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

The ambulance driver "confessed to transporting a hostage from the Israel border into the Gaza strip," Hagari said.

"We found more, dozens more and we will provide information about them in the future."

Gaza's Health Ministry said on social media that the four patients, three of whom were in the intensive care unit, died Friday morning after generators stopped working cutting power to oxygen machines.

The ministry had earlier issued an urgent appeal for assistance to save nine critically endangered patients in the intensive care and maternity units, saying the hospital had suffered a complete loss of power.

"We hold the Israeli occupation responsible for the lives of patients and crews considering that the complex is now under its full control. We appeal to all institutions to quickly intervene to save patients and staff in Nasser Medical Complex before it's too late," the ministry wrote in a Facebook post.

Gaza health officials also said women and children had been forced to evacuate the old Nasser building where the delivery rooms were located, which the IDF was now using as barracks. At least two women had since given birth "without electricity, water, food and heating," they said.

Meanwhile, posting on X following a late-night cabinet meeting Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu dismissed "all talk of imposing a Palestinian state on Israel" unilaterally, saying it would not be constructive because it would reward terror and block off routes to peace.

"Israel outright rejects international dictates regarding a permanent settlement with the Palestinians. Such an arrangement will be reached only through direct negotiations between the parties, without preconditions.

"Israel will continue to oppose the unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state. Such recognition in the wake of the Oct. 7 massacre would give a huge reward to unprecedented terrorism and prevent any future peace settlement," wrote Netanyahu.

The Palestinian Authority responded angrily accusing Netanyahu of attempting to sabotage peace efforts and isolate Palestinians.

The Palestinian Foreign Affairs Ministry accused Netanyahu of publicly dismissing the idea to thwart negotiations, as it said he has done in the past.

"The Palestinian state is not a gift or favor from Netanyahu, but rather an entitlement imposed by international law and international legitimacy resolutions," the ministry said.

Israeli forces move into Gaza's Nasser hospital; at least 1 patient killed

Israeli forces made their way into Nasser hospital Thursday, saying intelligence indicated Hamas was operating out of the facility. At least one patient was killed. Displaced Palestinians are seen here taking refuge in the hospital in December.

Israel confirmed Thursday that its forces were conducting an operation inside one of Gaza's few functioning hospitals in the southern city of Khan Younis in pursuit of Hamas operatives and that several suspects had been captured.

Israel Defense Forces were operating "against the terrorist organization Hamas" inside the Nasser Hospital compound, IDF said in a post on X.

The military action was, the post added, based on intelligence information "indicating terrorist activity by Hamas at the hospital and its goal is to reach terrorist operatives, including those suspected of involvement in the Oct. 7 massacre."

"A number of suspects have been detained at the hospital," IDF said.

Officials in Gaza's Hamas-run Health Ministry said in a social media post that the hospital's orthopedic department had been targeted, killing at least one patient and injuring many others.

Israeli troops entered the complex hours after Israel ordered thousands of displaced Palestinians sheltering there to evacuate but said medical staff and patients could remain.

The United Nations had said the hospital was minimally functioning before IDF made its way in and is one of 11 hospitals functioning in Gaza.

The latest figures from the Hamas-affiliated Gaza Ministry of Health show 87 people were killed and 104 injured in Gaza in the past 24 hours, bringing the total death toll since the outbreak of hostilities on Oct. 7 to 28,663, with 68,395 injuries.

Meanwhile, 200 miles to the northeast on the Israel-Lebanon border, Israeli warplanes were in action for a second straight day, striking at Hezbollah launch positions, military buildings and other "terrorist infrastructure" of the militant organization in the Wadi Saluki area, the IDF wrote on social media.

"This morning fighter jets attacked a terrorist infrastructure of the Hezbollah terrorist organization in the Lavon area," IDF said.

The airstrikes followed an overnight attack on a Hezbollah military structure in the A-Taiba area.

On Wednesday, Israel fired rockets into Lebanon with "an extensive wave" of airstrikes by its warplanes in retaliation for a rocket attack on Safed in northern Israel that killed an Israeli woman and injured eight others.

Rockets also landed in the towns of Netua and Menara and at an IDF base in northern Israel, damaging launch site.

Why Israel has entered southern Gaza hospital to fight Hamas

Israeli special forces entered Nasser Hospital on Thursday to fight against Palestinian militant group Hamas, accusing fighters of holding hostages at the medical facility that humanitarian groups have warned should not become a battleground in the war.

Israeli military spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said there was “credible evidence” that Hamas used Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis, a city in southern Gaza, as a base for hostage-keeping and that special forces units trained for this specific mission would conduct a “precise and limited operation” at the facility.

Hagari alleged intelligence indicates that 85 percent of medical facilities in Gaza are used for Hamas military operations.

“There may be bodies of our hostages in the Nasser Hospital facility,” he said in a video, adding Israeli forces also “seek to hunt down Hamas terrorists wherever they may be hiding.”

He noted that they have communicated with hospital staff and said there is no need to evacuate, but they also used loudspeakers to tell other nearby Palestinians to leave the area through a humanitarian corridor. Hagari added that Israel sent medical supplies to the hospital and it does not seek to shut down crucial life-saving operations.

International medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders said a forced evacuation of the hospital began Tuesday when an Israeli military bulldozer destroyed a northern entrance gate and ordered people to leave.

“People have been forced into an impossible situation: stay at Nasser Hospital against the Israeli military’s orders and become a potential target or exit the compound into an apocalyptic landscape where bombings and evacuation orders are part of daily life,” said Lisa Macheiner, the group’s project coordinator in Gaza.

Doctors Without Borders, which has staff on the ground, said at least five people have already been killed and 10 others wounded this week by shots fired at the hospital.

More than 28,000 people have died in Gaza since the war started, according to the Hamas-run Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza.

A spokesperson for the Health Ministry condemned the Israeli raid of Nasser in a statement on Facebook, saying it has forced staff “to keep intensive care patients without medical equipment, which puts their lives in grave danger.”

Israel’s fighting in Gaza hospitals has sparked concerns from human rights groups and nations critical of the war in the coastal strip.

In November, Israel raided Gaza City’s largest hospital, Al-Shifa, after also claiming it was a base for terrorist operations. The raid sparked major concerns at the time.

While Israel showed evidence of some military activity at Al-Shifa, including guns and laptops and what appeared to be a nearby Hamas tunnel, critics have questioned whether the material uncovered justified a raid.

Under the Geneva Convention laws of war, medical facilities are not lawful targets unless they have been used by a military unit.

The military has fought in several hospitals across the Gaza Strip in the war with Hamas, which Israel is waging against the group in retaliation for an attack on Oct. 7 in southern Israel that killed some 1,200 people and saw the kidnapping of around 240 hostages.

The World Health Organization said Feb. 9 there have been more than 350 attacks on Gaza medical facilities in the war and more than 645 people have died.

Nasser hospital in 'catastrophic' condition as Israeli troops raid

Israel's military claims it has captured "dozens" of terror suspects during a raid on southern Gaza's main hospital, as staff and patients were forced to flee under gunfire.

Israel said it launched a "precise and limited mission" at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, adding it had intelligence that Hamas had held hostages there.

Hamas dismissed the claim as "lies".

The hospital's director told the BBC that conditions inside were "catastrophic and very dangerous".

The Israel Defense Forces' chief spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, said among those captured was a participant in Hamas's attack inside Israel on 7 October, "an ambulance driver for Hamas" who had driven a hostage into Gaza, and a member of the armed Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine group.

He said that interrogations of "terrorists who were arrested or surrendered in the area" and the testimonies of freed hostages, had "determined that kidnapped Israelis were previously held in the hospital compound".

However, he said Israeli special forces involved in the hospital raid had yet to find any evidence of kidnapped Israelis and that the search was continuing.

His comments came hours after images, verified by the BBC, showed medical staff rushing patients on stretchers through a corridor filled with smoke or dust.

One patient - who is still in their bed - can be seen being moved through a corridor where the ceiling is damaged.

Other patients can also be seen, including one person being carried away in what looks like a blanket.

In another clip, people can be seen placing furniture and other items against a door as a narrator states in English that Israeli forces are about to enter.

A nurse inside the hospital told the BBC that a "large number of dogs" had been released inside the hospital during the operation.

Nahed Abu-Teima the director of Nasser, told BBC Arabic that there had been "violent shelling and severe explosions" for several hours "in the vicinity of the complex".

He said the patients who had remained at the facility were "piled up in wards" with critical injuries and appealed to the UN and Red Cross to "save" them and the staff.

Nasser is one of the few hospitals still functioning in Gaza, and has been the scene of intense fighting between the IDF and Hamas for days.

Thursday's operation came a day after the IDF ordered thousands of displaced people who had been sheltering at the site to leave.

Israel's military said it had assured Nasser hospital staff that patients and staff were not obliged to leave, and that medics could continue treating Gazan patients.

Dr Ashraf al-Quadra, a spokesperson for the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza, denied that was the case, saying Israeli troops had forced the hospital management to "keep intensive care patients without medical equipment".

A pharmacist who works in the hospital, Rawan Al-Mughrabi, was among those evacuated by Israeli forces on Wednesday.

She told BBC Arabic there was "a state of panic that made people [being evacuated] stand on top of each other and scream. Many people were harmed, and others returned to the hospital.

"As soon as we left the hospital gate and reached the checkpoints, the entire hospital and departments were stormed by police dogs, and while we were standing at the checkpoints, many people were arrested.

"Most of the medical cases were evacuated from the hospital, and only the very critical cases remained," she said.

On Wednesday, the UN's humanitarian office said there were allegations of sniper fire at the complex, putting the lives of doctors, patients and displaced people at risk.

The medical charity Medicins San Frontieres said those ordered to evacuate faced an impossible choice - to stay "and become a potential target" or leave "into an apocalyptic landscape" of bombings.

Israel launched its military offensive after waves of Hamas fighters burst through Israel's border on 7 October, killing about 1,200 people - mainly civilians - and taking 253 others back to Gaza as hostages.

The Hamas-run health ministry says more than 28,600 people, mainly women and children - have been killed in Israel's campaign. Israel says its aim is to destroy Hamas and secure the return of the hostages.

Israel is facing increasing international pressure to show restraint. On Wednesday France's President Emmanuel Macron phoned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to say Israel's operations in Gaza "must cease" and that the human cost of the Gaza operation was "intolerable".

But Mr Netanyahu insisted his troops will advance on the Gazan city of Rafah, which has already come under bombardment. Some 1.4 million Palestinians are sheltering in the area.

The prime ministers of Australia, Canada and New Zealand issued a joint statement expressing their "grave concern" that a military operation in Rafah would be "catastrophic".

Gaza's Nasser hospital: Fears for patients as Israeli raid continues

The Israeli military says its special forces are still inside the Nasser hospital in Gaza as fears grow for patients at the site.

Israel launched what it described as a "precise and limited mission" there on Thursday. The military says it has caught "dozens of terror suspects".

Hamas dismissed that claim as "lies". The Hamas-run health ministry said five people died after generators failed.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said the facility urgently needed fuel.

It said the fuel was vital to "ensure the continuation of the provision of life-saving services".

Tarik Jasarevic, a WHO spokesperson, said there were now reports that the orthopaedic unit at the hospital, in the city of Khan Younis, had been damaged.

"That obviously reduces the ability to provide the urgent medical care," he said, adding there were still "critically injured and sick patients" at the hospital.

"More degradation to the hospital means more lives being lost."

Nasser is the main hospital in southern Gaza, and is one of the few still functioning. It has been the scene of intense fighting between the IDF and Hamas for days.

An injured man who had to leave the hospital said the conditions there were dire.

"Since they besieged it, there is no water or food," Raed Abed told the Associated Press.

"Garbage is widespread, and sewage has flooded the emergency department."

The hospital's director, Nahed Abu-Teima, told BBC Arabic the situation inside was "catastrophic and very dangerous".

The Hamas-run health ministry reported on Friday that the five people who died at the hospital did so after the electricity generators went down and oxygen could not be provided.

The deaths have not been independently verified.

On Wednesday, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) ordered thousands of displaced people who had been sheltering there to leave.

Images, verified by the BBC, showed medical staff rushing patients on stretchers through a corridor filled with smoke or dust.

The IDF believes Hamas has been using hospitals and other civilian bases as shields for military activities.

"We can't give them [Hamas] a free pass, we have to make sure that they are pursued and hunted down," IDF spokesperson Lt Col Peter Lerner told the BBC.

He said the military had been making "a huge effort to evacuate people from the hospital in order to get them out of harm's way", denying claims that civilians had been targeted.

The IDF said that among those it had captured at the hospital were 20 Hamas members who were part of the 7 October attacks on Israel.

It also said it had found weapons, including grenades, at the facility.

The military is also searching for the bodies of Israeli hostages which it said intelligence suggests might be hidden in the hospital.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said Israeli tanks were targeting the nearby Al-Amal hospital, "resulting in very severe damage in two nursing rooms".

They wrote on social media that nobody had been hurt.

Intense hostilities have been reported around the hospital recently. The PRCS said it was raided last week after some 8,000 displaced people and patients complied with an order to evacuate.

On Friday, they said that two doctors who were arrested during the raid had been released, while 12 other staff remained in custody.

Israel launched its military offensive after waves of Hamas fighters burst through Israel's border on 7 October, killing about 1,200 people - mainly civilians - and taking 253 others back to Gaza as hostages.

The Hamas-run health ministry says more than 28,700 people, mainly women and children - have been killed in Israel's campaign.

Israel is facing increasing international pressure to show restraint but efforts to negotiate an end to the fighting have not yet yielded any results.

A senior Palestinian official familiar with the ceasefire talks told the BBC that the gap between the negotiating parties was still wide and there were disagreements over many of the proposed provisions.

Senior officials from the US, Israel, Egypt and Qatar have been meeting in Cairo this week to try and hammer out a deal.

The official said that the main issue remains the disagreement with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over what happens the day after the war is over. The US want to rely on a strengthened Palestinian Authority, while Israel is against having a single administration in charge of the West Bank and Gaza.

Another disagreement is over Israel's aim of completely destroying Hamas, which the US thinks will be difficult to achieve anytime soon.

The US is said to be trying to pressure the two sides to reach a long period of calm to make it difficult for the two sides to return to fighting again.