Tel Aviv hospital goes underground to shelter patients from rocket attacks

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/ Middle East

ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR

In Tel Aviv, the city’s largest public hospital is preparing to shelter patients underground, in what is normally its car park. Ichilov hospital was built in 2006 after the city was struck by rockets during Israel’s war with Lebanese militia Hezbollah, so that it could continue to treat patients during wartime. Our special correspondents Pauline Godart and Amar Al Hameedawi visited the site.

Issued on: 20/10/2023 – 08:43

1 min

02:14

A Tel Aviv hospital has gone underground to shelter patients from rocket attacks. © FRANCE 24 screengrab

Beneath Ichilov hospital, staff are busy at work. Beds, medical equipment, oxygen supplies … everything must be ready for patients. At any moment, 700 of the hospital’s 1,600 beds could be transferred to this secured area where all the departments are grouped together on three levels.

“The underground hospital is normally used as a car park,” said Dr Franck Atlan, Director of hand microsurgery at the Ichilov Hospital Orthopaedic Department.

“We have numbers that actually correspond to the bed number. Because in wartime, this space ceases to be a car park and becomes a hospital,” Atlan said.

Since the start of the war, Tel Aviv has been the target of daily rocket attacks from Hamas.

”In the event of an alarm, we have a minute and a half to get to a protected area,” said Atlan. “And a minute and a half is a luxury because on the immediate edge of Gaza, it’s 30 seconds. It’s 30 seconds to get to safety.”

But some patients have already been moved underground.

“I’m working in dialysis, and when there’s an alarm, we can’t disconnect the patients and they can’t run to a safe place. So now here they feel very safe as it’s in a safe place, we don’t need to run anywhere and they feel very safe here,” said Yulia, a nurse.

Click on the player above to watch the video report in full.