There was a time when an attack on a hospital was almost unthinkable. Today, in the Gaza Strip, such strikes are becoming increasingly common, and it is hard to count the number of times the IDF have operated against hospitals there, despite the international outrage such actions provoke.
Philip Gritti, an X user who has been covering wars in Israel and Ukraine on a regular basis, posted a thread after the strike in which he presented a theory about what led to this particular attack, and more broadly, about why hospitals in Gaza have become battlegrounds.
Hamas and Hospitals: A Grim Strategy
Munir Al-Barash, the Gaza Strip's health director, is transforming the Strip's hospitals into Hamas terrorist bases. pic.twitter.com/PDn2KC4qZd
— Ph.Gritti (@Philipp27960841) August 25, 2025
Gaza's health minister is Dr. Munir Al-Barash. Like every other senior official in the Strip, he is a Hamas member. He is also a businessman and one of the wealthiest men in Gaza. He heads Namaa, which controls all agriculture in the Gaza Strip. That organization also serves Hamas' interests, providing the terrorist organization with food and economic security.
Al-Barash is close to the Haniyeh family, as shown by numerous photos of him with them – not only at official events. Some even claim that he personally managed the Haniyeh family's fortune.
According to this analysis, his appointment as health minister served a dual purpose: as a Hamas insider, he guaranteed the organization free rein inside Gaza hospitals, and as a doctor, he could issue authoritative statements inflating the number of supposedly innocent civilians killed by the IDF.
