Palestinian fugitives draw hospitals into line of fire

Four years into the Israeli-Palestinian fighting, it's not only the sick that are using Bethlehem's hospitals. Armed fugitives from militant groups also seek shelter there from the long arm of the Israeli army, drawing even medicine into the circle of conflict.

Last month, the Holy Family Hospital became the third Bethlehem-area health institution in the past six months to find itself on the receiving end of Israeli army action after army intelligence determined that fugitives were on hospital grounds. "The hospital was besieged for three hours" says a hospital staffer, who asked for anonymity.

The ability of these self-invited guests to ensconce themselves in hospitals is a symptom of a larger phenomenon of West Bank lawlessness and a sign of the breakdown of Palestinian governance, both the Israeli army and the Palestinian Authority agree. But they differ sharply over who is to blame. The PA says its security force has been crippled by Israel, making it impossible to restore order. The army, for its part, says the PA lacks the will to crack down on those it views as terrorists.

At the Holy Family Hospital, "[Israeli] soldiers brought a picture taken by a drone and pointed on it to the laundry room in a remote area," the staffer recalls. "The soldiers started shooting for a long time, though no one was hurt. They brought in a bulldozer and said they would demolish the laundry room. But then the fugitives called the receptionist and said they would turn themselves in. Everyone was shocked that they were hiding on the hospital grounds."

The fugitives, Ratib and Adnan Abayat of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a militia that Wednesday claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing in Jerusalem and is affiliated with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, were living in their hideout for a year, according to Israeli army spokesman Capt. Jacob Dallal. "They set up shop there full time," he says. A statement by the president of the hospital's board of trustees, Jacques de Dumast, said the presence of the fugitives was "without our knowledge" and was "inadmissible as it violates our essential neutrality."

But at the Bethlehem Psychiatric Hospital, where the presence of five fugitives from the brigades ensconced in the administration building ended with an army raid in May, director Issam Banura says he did not investigate afterward to discern if his staffers were helping the fugitives.

"If I knew they were there I would not accept a foreign body coming into the hospital," he says. "It is dangerous for the patients and the hospital." But, he adds, "I am not in a position to interrogate the staff. As Palestinian people, we feel we have the right to protect them. Some employee might have thought he has to protect them." The hospital has 160 patients and is the only psychiatric hospital in the West Bank.

"I can advise these people to leave but I cannot order them. It is not my house, it is a public place for all Palestinians, not just for me," Dr. Banura says. "If they insist, I cannot force them and I cannot call the police since we have no functioning security services."

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