Rescuers and paramedics carry a body of a child found at a site of a building heavily damaged during a Russian missile strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, July 8, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko

Israel has offered to take in and treat child cancer patients displaced by Russia’s deadly missile strike that destroyed part of Ukraine’s largest children’s hospital in Kyiv on Monday, according to a new report.

At least 42 people were killed in the massive Russian daytime barrage in multiple Ukrainian cities. The Okhmatdyt children’s hospital, including its childhood cancer ward, was hit during the onslaught. Pictures on social media showed parents comforting bloodied children and rescuers digging bodies from amidst the building’s rubble. 

“We are extracting whoever we can. We don’t know the number of people trapped there,” Ukrainian Health Minister Viktor Liashko said in a press conference outside the hospital.

Following the destruction, Israel offered to take in and treat displaced cancer patients from the Ukrainian hospital to the Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan, according to the Israeli media outlet Ynet. The offer was reportedly conveyed to the Ukrainians by Israel’s Ambassador to Ukraine, Michael Brodsky.

“The Israeli embassy has long-standing ties with the Okhmatdyt Hospital. At the beginning of the war, the embassy delivered medical equipment to the hospital, their doctors visited Israel, our doctors came and advised online,” Brodsky told Ynet. “The embassy is exploring the possibility of assisting in the rehabilitation of the heavily damaged hospital. I also spoke with the Sheba Medical Center.”

Brodsky noted that, at the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022, several children with oncological diseases who were hospitalized in Ukraine were evacuated to Israel for treatment. “Israel has a reputation as a country with a big heart, and we are doing everything to maintain that reputation,” he said.

According to Sheba Medical Center, located by Tel Aviv, its professionals treat around 50,000 cancer patients a year and are the “absolute leader in cancer treatment in Israel.”

Meanwhile, world leaders have condemned the Russian attack this week.

“Russia’s missile strikes that today [Monday] killed dozens of Ukrainian civilians and caused damage and casualties at Kyiv’s largest children’s hospital are a horrific reminder of Russia’s brutality,” US President Joe Biden tweeted.

Jens Stoltenberg, the secretary general of NATO, decried Russia’s strikes on civilian targets in Kyiv as “horrendous.”

In the past, Israel has come to the aid of nations confronted by humanitarian crises. In 2020, for example, Israel dispatched teams to Honduras and Turkey in the aftermath of earthquakes in each country.

Israel has also provided numerous instances of aid to war-torn Ukraine since Russia’s large-scale invasion in early 2022. According to Mashav, the Israeli government’s foreign aid department, an Israeli field hospital was established in western Ukraine staffed by personnel from Sheba Medical Center. Magav has also shipped food, medicine, and generators to war-torn regions of Ukraine.

The Russian strike came before NATO leaders gathered in Washington, DC for a summit this week. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was also in the US capital and urged the NATO leaders to act promptly in standing up to Russian aggression.