GAZA CITY, Palestine

Twenty-one Palestinian patients left the Gaza Strip on Thursday for medical treatment in coordination with the World Health Organization (WHO), a medical source said.

“Some 21 sick and wounded Palestinians, suffering from difficult health conditions, left Gaza to receive treatment abroad,” the source told Anadolu.

He said the patients left the blockaded enclave through the Kerem Shalom crossing in southern Gaza in coordination between the WHO and Israel.

On Sunday, six Palestinian children left the Palestinian territory for medical attention abroad in coordination with the WHO.

According to Gaza’s government media office, thousands of sick and injured Palestinians are at risk of death amid Israel’s crippling blockade on the enclave.

Israel, flouting a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire, has faced international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza since an Oct. 7 attack by Hamas.

More than 37,700 Palestinians have since been killed in Gaza, most of them women and children, and nearly 86,400 others injured, according to local health authorities.

More than eight months into the Israeli onslaught, vast tracts of Gaza lie in ruins amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water and medicine.

​​​​​​​Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, whose latest ruling ordered it to immediately halt its operation in the southern city of Rafah, where more than 1 million Palestinians had sought refuge from the war before it was invaded on May 6.

*Writing by Ahmed Asmar in Ankara