It is no secret in the medical world that Israel has been attacking hospitals and health infrastructure in Gaza for many years. For example, according to the UN Fact Finding Mission , on the 15th of January 2009, the Israeli army attacked directly and intentionally Al-Quds hospital in Gaza City and the adjacent ambulance depot with white phosphorous shells; and the mission rejected the Israeli allegations that fire was directed at the Israeli army from the hospital. (BMJ 2014; 349 Published 28 July 2014).
Israeli mass murder of children
UNICEF* explains it thus: “EAST JERUSALEM/AMMAN/NEW YORK, 8 January 2025 – At least 74 children have reportedly been killed in relentless violence in the Gaza Strip in just the first seven days of 2025. Children have reportedly been killed in several mass casualty events, including nighttime attacks in Gaza City, Khan Younis, and Al Mawasi, a unilaterally designated ‘safe zone’ in the south. The most recent attack, yesterday, saw five children reportedly killed in Al Mawasi.“
A child and his father as they pass through the rubble of buildings in Gaza.
Yet Israeli lies about these attacks are still given credence in the press and in the medical journals. There is even a term for these kinds of Israeli lies – medical lawfare.
One year ago today, WHO visited the al Shifa hospital on 7 January 2024. Director General Tedros Ghebreyesus said, “Staff saw sickening scenes of people of all ages being treated on blood streaked floors and in chaotic corridors. An unidentified child laid dead, partially covered by a sheet, on a bed. The bloodbath in Gaza must …”
So these lies must be wearing pretty thin. Yet the BMJ continued to report these lies. As recently as the 24th of December 2024 under heading: “Israel reportedly orders closure of crucial hospital in northern Gaza” the BMJ reported the stock denial by Israel: “Israel Defence Forces has told The BMJ it is “unaware of any evacuation order of the hospital.” You would have to wonder why they would bother given the track record of the IDF fully participating in plausible genocide (according to the International Court of Justice ICJ findings in 2024).
A large group gathered in King George Square in Brisbane on Friday, 3 January 2025. Many of them were health care workers. They came to protest the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) raid on the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lagos last Friday.
The IDF forcibly removed patients and staff and then set the facility on fire. The hospital was the last medical facility in northern Gaza that remained open since the Israeli genocide against the Palestinians began in October 2023.#JusticeforPalestine #Gaza
Ian Curr
7 January 2025
References
People may ask why UNICEF does not name Israel for the mass slaughter of children,
Who contributes the most to UNICEF?
United States of America
Largest core donor to UNICEF in 2022 (in million was United States of America, $134USD
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=shared&v=ej4XM-k5XAQ
“UNRWA’s expulsion from Jerusalem will seal Israel’s illegal annexation” – Chris Gunness, former head of UNRWA.
There have even been reports that Israel’s Land Authority will seize the UNRWA headquarters and turn it over to illegal Jewish settlers for 1,440 housing units, in blatant breach of Israel’s international law obligations.
Nonetheless, it seems UNRWA’s Jerusalem HQ may be shut down in the face of Israeli threats, violence and pressure. Staff are being told to relocate to offices in Amman as a result of a performance review and UNRWA says its Jerusalem HQ was only ever temporary.
But a recent communication from UNRWA to its donors makes clear that the agency is ceding to Israeli intimidation: “While the review of HQ functions has been underway for a number of years, the review and decision has been fast-tracked as a result of the administrative and operational challenges experienced by the agency throughout 2024, including visa issuance, visa duration and lack of issuing diplomatic ID cards. These challenges have inhibited our effectiveness to work as a Headquarters in Jerusalem”. See https://www.newarab.com/opinion/unrwas-expulsion-jerusalem-will-seal-israels-annexation
At least 74 children murdered by Israel in Gaza in the first 7 days of 2025 …
https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/new-year-brings-little-new-hope-children-gaza-least-74-children-reportedly-killed
In December 2023, the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to health, Dr Tlaleng Mofokeng, warned in relation to the situation in Gaza that “the practice of medicine is under attack” and “we are in the darkest time for the right to health in our lifetimes”. More than a year later, and with the killing by Israel of more than 1000 Palestinian health professionals and near total destruction of a whole healthcare system, that catastrophic reality now casts an even greater shadow over humanity.
Israel’s targeting of healthcare in Gaza has become so normalised that each new atrocity against hospitals, their staff, the sick and injured, ambulances and aid deliveries receives fleeting media attention, if any, before it is overtaken by another, and another and another.
On 10 October 2024, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights was explicit about the nature of Israel’s actions. In releasing a new report from the UN commission on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, UN leaders stated that Israeli attacks on healthcare are not accidental. They said: “Israel has perpetrated a concerted policy to destroy Gaza’s healthcare system as part of a broader assault on Gaza, committing war crimes and the crime against humanity of extermination with relentless and deliberate attacks on medical personnel and facilities.” Israeli security forces have deliberately killed, detained and tortured medical personnel and targeted medical vehicles. Children, the UN said, have borne the brunt of these attacks, suffering both directly and indirectly from the collapse of the health system.
On 27 December, Northern Gaza’s last operational major health facility, the Kamal Adwan Hospital, was destroyed, and its director, Dr Hussam Abu Safiyeh, detained, reportedly at the Sde Teiman prison that is notorious for its brutality.
We are familiar with the Israeli Government’s claims that hospitals in Gaza are being used for military purposes by Palestinian armed groups. However a further UN report released on 31 December 2024 specifically addressed these claims, stating that “insufficient information has so far been made available to substantiate these allegations, which have remained vague and broad, and in some cases appear contradicted by publicly available information”.
In the face of such catastrophic attacks on one of our most fundamental rights — the right to healthcare — there is a heavy onus on health professionals, tasked with the preservation of human life, to speak out. The implications of what is happening to the people of Gaza are profound – for each and every one of them, and for healthcare globally. When the right to healthcare is violated with utter impunity and on a most grotesque scale, healthcare everywhere is vulnerable.
But what can any of us do or say that matters, when Israel’s friends and allies — including the Australian Government — are guilty to varying degrees of complicity with genocide? We cannot wait for governments to do the right thing. There must be pressure applied at the level of civil society, as the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement has long recognised.
On 30 December, the United Nations special rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Francesca Albanese, implored the global medical community to cut ties with Israel. She tweeted: “I urge medical professionals worldwide to pursue the severance of all ties with Israel as a concrete way to forcefully denounce Israel’s full destruction of the Palestinian healthcare system in Gaza, a critical tool of its ongoing genocide.” She also urged leaders everywhere to demand the release of Dr Safiyeh.
While cutting ties with Israeli organisations can send a powerful message of condemnation of Israeli Government actions, we should also recognise and support those Israeli organisations that vehemently oppose the destruction of Gaza and need our support in doing so. Israeli Physicians for Human Rights is one; it provides courageous leadership in a hostile environment, attempting to protect the rights of the Palestinian people. The barriers to its work are enormous, and they emphasise the critical importance of international pressure on Israel.
A particular IPHR campaign is for adequate medical care to be provided to Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons. IPHR states that, “forced disappearances, torture, and severe violations of human rights, particularly in terms of health, are now inherent in the practices and policies of Israeli security bodies responsible for Palestinians in custody”. Further, it states that not only the Israeli Ministry of Health, but also the Israeli Medical Association, have failed in their duty towards incarcerated Palestinians.
IPHR appeals to medical organisations worldwide to support its efforts, including by condemnation of Israel’s policies of torture, abuse and neglect, and by urging the IMA to act for an end to these practices.
The need for global outrage against the dehumanising of Palestinians and for the protection of their health care — what’s left of it — is abundantly clear. Health professionals, for whom our common humanity is the foundation of everything, have a critical role to play in this
ACT Police violence against peaceful Palestine protest. 3 January 2025 and 455 days of the Zionist entity’s slaughter of the people of Gaza and the weekly peaceful protest march in support of Palestinians in Canberra’s CBD. 100+ protesters in support of the Palestinian People’s struggle for self-determination, and against genocide and the entities decades long occupation, were attacked and strong armed by ACT police. Since the beginning of the occupation, the weekly march always proceeds down Bunda St, which is a pedestrian priority shared street. We have always taken this route without incident and accompanied by police. This time however police started shouting into our faces to move off the road and attempted to block protesters passage. We refused and continued to proceed up the street as we always have. Police then singled out the march organisers and others, mainly women, pushing, pulling, and shoving us. It seemed they would arrest people. We stopped to demand that the police let them go, which they finally did. We continued down the street, and before exiting, we sat down on the street for several minutes to make the point that we had the street. March organisers will be making a formal complaint.
Pedro Curtis
7 Jan 2025