Afghanistan Claims Pakistan Responsible for Deadly Kabul Hospital Attack, Hundreds Feared Dead

An airstrike reportedly targeting a hospital in Afghanistan is under increasing scrutiny, not just for the attack itself, but also for what some perceive as a lackluster global response.

According to Reuters, Afghanistan’s Taliban-led administration announced that over 400 individuals perished and many more sustained injuries when the Omid Hospital, a key drug rehabilitation center in Kabul, was struck. Meanwhile, cross-border strikes in Pakistan have also resulted in civilian casualties, including children, as reported by The Associated Press.

These casualty numbers have yet to be independently confirmed.

This incident occurs amid a rapidly intensifying military conflict between Pakistan and Afghanistan, which has seen significant escalation over the last three weeks.

The site of the destroyed drug rehabilitation hospital, which the Taliban claims was targeted by a Pakistani airstrike, lies in Kabul, Afghanistan, as of March 17, 2026. (Sayed Hassib/Reuters)

Cross-border airstrikes and clashes have expanded across multiple provinces, with Pakistan targeting what it says are bases of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a militant group responsible for attacks inside Pakistan and designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. The Taliban government has accused Islamabad of violating Afghanistan’s sovereignty.

At a United Nations briefing Wednesday, a U.N. spokesperson said the conflict has now entered its third week, with widespread civilian impact. More than 115,000 people have been displaced, more than 300 shelters damaged or destroyed, and at least 25 health facilities closed or disrupted due to the fighting, according to U.N. humanitarian agencies.

Pakistan has denied targeting a hospital, saying the operation struck militant infrastructure.

“Since the beginning of this counterterrorism campaign, Pakistan has sought to defend and protect the people of Pakistan … by targeting terrorists and terrorist infrastructure that are incubated and nurtured by the Afghan Taliban,” the prime minister’s spokesperson Mosharraf Zaidi told Fox News Digital.

Red Crescent volunteers carry the body of a victim who died in what the Taliban said was a Pakistani air strike on a drug rehabilitation hospital, in Kabul, Afghanistan, March 17, 2026.  (Sayed Hassib/Reuters)

Zaidi said the strike targeted weapons and ammunition at Camp Phoenix in Kabulm Afghanistan, and insisted, “There are no civilian hospitals in Camp Phoenix,” adding that reports of a rehabilitation facility being hit may be due to “secondary explosions” from stored weapons.

The United Nations on Wednesday, two days after the attack, condemned the reported strike, with Secretary-General António Guterres, through a spokesperson, “strongly condemning” an airstrike that “reportedly resulted in the death (and) injury of civilians at a hospital,” and calling for an independent investigation.

Still, some analysts say the response does not match the scale of the incident.

“U.N. officials swiftly condemned U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran’s regime as unlawful ‘aggression’ … Yet Pakistan’s airstrike on Kabul’s Omid Hospital — killing over 400 civilians — has drawn only a belated ‘strong condemnation’ … and standard pleas for ‘de-escalation’,” Executive Director of UN Watch Hillel Neuer told Fox News Digital.

Afghan Taliban fighters patrol near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border in Spin Boldak, Kandahar Province, following exchanges of fire between Pakistani and Afghan forces. (Reuters/Stringer/File Photo)

“This restrained response — no personal outrage from Guterres, no emergency session naming Pakistan, and no equivalent chorus from U.N. rapporteurs, or agencies like WHO, U.N. Women, and UNICEF — reveals rank hypocrisy,” he said. “When hundreds of vulnerable Afghans die in a hospital, the U.N. offers measured words. Yet when the U.S. or Israel can be blamed — justifiably or not — the condemnation is immediate and overwhelming. When some victims matter far more than others, the U.N. reveals its cynical political agenda. This double standard doesn’t uphold human rights, it erodes them.” 

Australian human rights lawyer Arsen Ostrovsky echoed that criticism in a post on X, calling the strike “an absolute massacre,” while noting what he described as a lack of global outrage: “World outrage? Zero. Could barely muster p17 in the newspaper here.”