GAZA CITY — A Palestinian doctor says a rare pair of conjoined twins born in the Gaza Strip is in good health, but will need treatment abroad.

Dr. Allam Abu Hamda, a neonatal specialist at Gaza's Al-Shifa hospital, said Monday that the girls are in "stable" condition and doctors have begun feeding them.

The sisters were born Saturday by cesarean section after a full-term pregnancy. Most cases die within 24 hours of birth, the doctor said.

The girls are joined at the abdomen and pelvis but they have separate heads and lungs. Palestinian hospitals lack equipment and expertise to separate the twins.

He says doctors are trying to arrange a transfer of the girls to advanced hospitals in the US or Saudi Arabia to determine whether they can be separated.

“We thought they were twins and we would have no problem, but we discovered that it is a Siamese baby,” said Hanan Al-Wade, a pediatrician at Al-Shifa, Gaza City’s main hospital.

“The body is one but with two heads.”

“Separating them is very hard because they are sharing many organs and they have a defective heart,” said Wade.

An uncle who preferred not to be named said: “We hope they can leave to do what is necessary for their rare conditions.”

Conjoined twins occur around once in every 200,000 live births. The survival rate is usually between five and 25 percent, doctors say. Around 70 percent of all conjoined twins are girls. — Agencies