Israel orders hospitals to get ready for treating thousands of wounded

JERUSALEM

Israel’s Health Ministry has ordered hospitals in the north of the country to prepare for the possibility of receiving thousands of injured people as tensions with the Lebanese Hezbollah group increase, a report said Tuesday.

According to the Israeli public broadcaster KAN, the ministry has asked medical centers in the north to prepare for the possibility of going into "deserted island mode,” that is being left without medical supplies, medicine and food for days.

The ministry also asked hospitals to go into emergency mode within a few hours and requested that they maintain a 50% occupancy rate.

Tensions have flared along the border between Lebanon and Israel amid intermittent exchanges of fire between Israeli forces and Hezbollah in the deadliest clashes since the two sides fought a full-scale war in 2006.

At least 158 Hezbollah members have been killed in clashes with Israeli forces near Lebanon’s border with Israel since the outbreak of the Gaza conflict on Oct. 7, according to figures released by the group.

The border tension comes amid an Israeli military offensive in the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7.

Israel has pounded Gaza since then, killing at least 23,210 Palestinians and injuring 59,167 others, according to local health authorities.

Around 1,200 Israelis are believed to have been killed in the Hamas offensive.

About 85% of Gazans have been displaced, while all of them are food insecure, according to the UN. Hundreds of thousands of people are living without shelter and ⁠less than half the aid trucks are entering the territory than before the start of the conflict.