## 1 Introduction  
The Gaza Strip has faced several challenges in the last seven decades that have led to the poor distribution of infrastructural facilities, especially in the healthcare sector which, notably, is of the utmost importance. The healthcare sector suffers inadequate spatial coverage and poor planning standards in their distribution in line with population and urban growth. A report published by the World Health Organization [1] narrated the vulnerable population groups suffering from the lack of access to primary healthcare, emergency services, and mental health services in Palestine. According to the report, there are 250,000 people in communities within the restricted access areas (about 2 km of the Gaza Strip border); over a million people fall into vulnerable groups across the Gaza Strip, including 287,000 neonates and children, 60,000 pregnant women, 700,000 chronic disease patients, 41 000 elderly people, and 6475 of the most vulnerable people with a disability due to conflict. Central to improving healthcare service delivery in the region under study is the issue of location. A suitably located hospital addresses important issues such as accessibility within a reasonable distance and time at a reasonable cost, availability of space that meets current service operational capacity and, at the same time, accommodates future development/emergency needs, capability for the projected target service population, and delivering community obligations [2; 3; 4]. From the forego, it is obvious that finding suitable sites for locating a hospital is a multiciteria problem that has numerous fundamental societal factors to be considered for the maximum benefit. Among healthcare experts and other stakeholders, there are mixed views and arguments on which criteria are most important-social, environmental, or economic. However, the entire decision-making process requires a multidisciplinary approach, involving healthcare professionals, government officials, engineers, environmentalists and social scientists, and other stakeholders [5]. On the part of the government, locating a hospital in the most appropriate place will help enhance the efficient allocation of medical resources, matching the provision of healthcare with the social and economic demands. In addition, it will ease the coordination of urban-rural health service development network and social challenges [6]. From the citizen point of view, building a hospital in a suitable location will improve access to healthcare services, minimizes emergency response time, improves citizen medical service satisfaction, and ultimately enhances the quality of life [7; 8]. For the healthcare services investors and operators, locating a hospital in the right place will certainly reduce the cost and guarantee a return on investment. For this, stakeholders usually employ the services of cost accounting to adapt to the development of the market economy. Overall, suitably locating a hospital in the appropriate site enhances the competitive advantage, and promotes branding, marketing, and human resources supply [6]. The optimal location of healthcare facilities is crucial to healthcare service delivery, accessibility, cost, and time response to patient-centered emergency needs. Over the recent decades, the capabilities of geospatial technologies have been utilized to optimize suitable site selection for different purposes [9]. Site suitability assessment has been widely accepted as a tool for making objective decisions related to locating public infrastructures by considering and balancing key factors such as topography, land availability, land use, population, economic, and other relevant parameters [2]. For example, the siting of some facilities requires that the site is free of any natural and environmental interference, such as natural hazard, noise, or business or traffic hazards, while at the same time is accessible to the present and future populations [10; 11].