Heavy fighting between Israeli forces and Hamas have trapped thousands of people in Gaza’s hospitals, as medics and aid workers warned patients will die in the crippled facilities unless there is a pause in the battle, AFP reports.

“If we do not stop this bloodshed immediately with a ceasefire or at the bare minimum a medical evacuation of patients, these hospitals will become a morgue,” medical aid group Doctors Without Borders warned.

Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, the biggest in the territory, is “totally surrounded and bombardments are going on nearby”, the hospital’s director, Mohammad Abu Salmiya, said in a statement last night.

“The medical team cannot work and the bodies, in their dozens, cannot be managed or buried,” he said.

Inside the hospital, Doctors Without Borders surgeon Mohammed Obeid said there was no water, power, food, or internet for about 600 post-operative patients, 37-40 babies and 17 people in intensive care.