Health Ministry

Israel bombarded the overcrowded Gaza city of Rafah, where it has launched a ground incursion, as talks resumed yesterday in Cairo aimed at agreeing the terms of a truce in the seven-month war.

Despite international objections, Israel sent tanks into Rafah on May 7 and seized the nearby crossing into Egypt that is the main conduit for aid into the besieged Palestinian territory.

Private doctors will be allowed to perform medical procedures in National Health System (ESY) hospitals, including surgeries, according to a Health Ministry amendment to a bill of the Ministry of Social Cohesion and Family. 

The Israel-Hamas war entered its 200th day on Tuesday, with fears mounting of an Israeli invasion in the overcrowded south of Gaza amid calls for hostages to be freed.

The Israeli army carried out intense shelling overnight of the Gaza neighbourhoods of Al-Tuffah, Shujaiya and Zeitun.

An amendment broadening the postal voting regulations has been proposed to Parliament as part of the Health Ministry's legislation and is scheduled for a plenary vote on Thursday. 

Accountability and transparency are severely lacking in the National Health System.

A study of 90 hospitals and their accounting statements from 2012-20 by the Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research (IOBE) has found rudimentary reporting that focuses on what state subsidies are spent on and makes no mention of how supplies are used and the state and age of the inventory.

In a concerted effort to bolster public health, Bulgaria's Health Ministry, in collaboration with UNICEF Bulgaria, announces a proactive campaign advocating the advantages of vaccination, the Ministry stated in a press release on Monday.

Eyewitnesses report that the Israeli army is pulling back from Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, as confirmed by an AFP journalist. Tanks are seen withdrawing from the premises, with the IDF allegedly firing shells to cover their exit before heading southwest of Gaza City.

The U.N.'s human rights chief has told the BBC that Israel is using starvation as a weapon in the war-torn Gaza by blocking aid deliveries, citing that if this intention is proven, it could be considered a war crime.

A series of Israeli airstrikes across southern Lebanon on Wednesday killed at least 16 people, including paramedics, in one of the deadliest days of fighting in the Israel-Lebanon border since the war in Gaza broke out nearly six months ago.

Türkiye on Monday welcomes the U.N. Security Council's passage of a resolution for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, said the country's Foreign Ministry.