Israeli strike near Beirut hospital kills five and wounds 52, MSF warns of health system strain

An Israeli airstrike struck a densely populated residential area in Beirut on Sunday afternoon, landing metres from Rafik Hariri Public Hospital, where a team from Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) was embedded in the emergency room. Five people were killed, including a 15-year-old girl and two Sudanese migrants. Fifty-two people, among them eight children, were wounded.

MSF condemned the strike as an attack on civilians and warned that bombardment in close proximity to health facilities creates fear that prevents people from seeking life-saving care.

Mass-casualty influx at Rafik Hariri hospital

The strike occurred at approximately 2pm local time. Within the first hour, emergency staff received a mass influx of casualties — people arriving bleeding, some carried on the shoulders of bystanders.

Dr. Luna Hammad, MSF Medical Coordinator, was present in the emergency room during the incident. "We are seeing elderly people and adolescents arriving with critical injuries to the head, chest and abdomen, including shrapnel wounds," she said.

"When strikes hit crowded residential areas without warning, the consequences are severe: both in human casualties and in hospitals' capacity to respond," Dr. Hammad added.

Among those who arrived was a man with severe head injuries who, in a state of panic, refused treatment until he had confirmed the safety of his young child, who had also been wounded. "Only after learning his son was safe did he allow doctors to tend to him — then we realised he had lost his ear," Dr. Hammad said.

MSF condemns strike, pledges continued support

In a statement issued following the incident, MSF condemned what it described as an attack on civilians in a highly populated area and called for the protection of both civilians and health facilities.

The organisation said it would donate a mass-casualty kit to the hospital and continue supporting facilities in Lebanon with medical expertise and essential supplies. "Civilians cannot be collateral damage," the statement read.

MSF cautioned that strikes in close proximity to hospitals spread fear among the population and can deter individuals from seeking medical attention, compounding the human cost of military operations.

Broader toll across Lebanon on 6 April

The Beirut strike was not an isolated event. According to official sources cited by MSF, 39 people were killed in Israeli attacks across Lebanon on 6 April alone. The Lebanese Ministry of Public Health reported that the cumulative death toll from Israeli strikes since 2 March 2026 had reached 1,530 by 7 April, up from 1,497 the previous day. The figure includes 102 women, 130 children, and 57 health workers. A further 4,812 people have been injured.

Earlier that same day, an Israeli strike on the town of Ain Saadeh, in the hills east of Beirut, killed three people, including two women, and injured three others. Al Jazeera correspondent Zeina Khodr reported that Ain Saadeh lies outside Hezbollah's area of influence and that those killed appeared to have no involvement in the conflict.

Al Jazeera's Heidi Pett, reporting from the scene, described the strike as an apparent targeted operation against a specific apartment on the third floor of a building. Residents told her the apartment was empty at the time, but damage was severe enough to kill people on the floor below.

Evacuation orders and continued strikes in southern suburbs

Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee issued evacuation orders for seven neighbourhoods in the southern suburbs of Beirut, citing planned strikes on what he described as Hezbollah infrastructure. A strike on the Bir al-Abed area of the southern suburbs was subsequently reported.

On Sunday, a separate strike on the Jnah area of southern Beirut killed five people including a 15-year-old girl and three Sudanese nationals — figures consistent with the Ministry of Public Health update issued the following day.

Ground invasion and infrastructure destruction in the south

The Beirut strikes accompany a deepening Israeli ground invasion in southern Lebanon, which the Israeli military formally launched on 16 March 2026. Israeli forces have targeted bridges and transport infrastructure across the south, a pattern observers have described as an effort to isolate the region from the rest of the country.

Elie Yaacoub, head of Mercy Corps' Lebanon Crisis Analysis Team, told Al Jazeera that the area south of the Litani River was not experiencing a conventional military escalation but rather "the systematic isolation of an entire population."

"The destruction of key bridges and transport routes is effectively cutting off up to 150,000 people from humanitarian assistance, creating conditions for a rapid deterioration in basic needs and access to essential services," Yaacoub said.

He drew a comparison to tactics employed during the 2006 war, noting that the current scale of need and the fragility of existing systems made the humanitarian consequences substantially more severe. "It sets back development by years, if not decades, and dramatically increases the cost and complexity of recovery," he said.

A drone strike near Ghandour Hospital in Nabatieh al-Fawqa killed one person and injured a second, according to local media. At least four people were killed in a separate raid that struck a vehicle in the southern town of Kfar Rumman, the Lebanese Civil Defence told Al Jazeera. Lebanon's state-run National News Agency also reported strikes across the Jabal Amel region.

More than one million people have been displaced across Lebanon, with thousands sheltering in the hills of Mount Lebanon. Israel has conducted airstrikes across the country since 2 March, following rocket fire into northern Israel by the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah.