Khan Younis, Gaza Strip – Ahmed Isleem wishes he was dead.
The 35-year-old man’s wife and daughter were killed along with 10 other family members and neighbors in an Israeli attack on their home. He lies on a bed at the European Gaza Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis, surrounded by the sounds of other patients moaning and screaming in pain.
Isleem was pulled from the rubble of his home last month.
“I can’t believe I’m still alive,” he said. “Getting out of the rubble was very difficult. I would have liked to be martyred with my family instead of going through the suffering and pain I am currently experiencing.
Isleem suffered multiple shrapnel wounds to various parts of his body, including his abdomen, and underwent surgery on his digestive system as well as another operation to insert platinum into his foot after his fracture .
“There is no safety, no treatment, nothing,” he said. “I can’t bear my pain or the screams of the other injured people around me. »
Due to lack of fuel and medical supplies and Israeli attacks on hospitals, the health system in the Gaza Strip has virtually collapsed. And as hospitals in northern Gaza and Gaza City were taken out of service, the burden on the few functioning hospitals in the center and south of the enclave grew.
The European Hospital in Gaza receives dozens of killed and wounded Palestinians daily, some of them from other overwhelmed hospitals. It is also a place of accommodation for displaced people, despite the lack of provisions.
Khawla Abu Daqqa, 40, is from the eastern region of Khan Younis, near the Israeli fence which has been a frequent target of bombings and artillery fire. She fled with her five children to the hospital, saying she had no choice.
“Where are we going? We have no shelter,” she said. “Everything is difficult here, from finding food, water and even sleeping. I wish I could sleep at least five hours a day. day. I can’t sleep or rest. I hope this war stops for everyone.
‘Extreme fatigue’
In a conversation with Tel Aviv Tribune, the director of the European Hospital in Gaza, Dr Youssef al-Aqqad, says the displaced people – who come from all over the Gaza Strip – must find space wherever they can in the hospital: at the doors. patient rooms, in the corridors, on the stairs and in the hospital garden.
“These displaced people need services, including food, water and electricity,” he said. “We are also very concerned that the Israeli army is targeting hospitals. This is an abnormal and terrifying thing for both the patients and the displaced people.
Al-Aqqad says dozens of wounded arrive daily from the towns of Rafah and Khan Younis.
As a result, the number of infections is increasing and exceeds the capacity the hospital can handle. Al-Aqqad says a field hospital has been set up in the Ras Naqoura school, which is adjacent to the east wing of the hospital and where patients with moderate or minor infections are treated.
“It is not an easy matter, but rather very complicated because schools are not equipped and adapted to accommodate infected people and there is no equipment or medical devices there,” says- he. “In addition, our medical staff are already out of breath and have to follow up here and there, which has led to extreme fatigue. »
The hospital has 450 injured patients. Some of them, he says, require multiple specialty doctors, such as a neurosurgeon, a vascular doctor, an orthopedist for fractures and another expert for burns.
The medical staff are exhausted from the incessant work and the volunteers who assist them have little or no experience.
“We need specialized doctors to work in intensive care rooms, in operations and in delicate surgical specialties,” says al-Aqqad. “We have reached a difficult stage in the health service and we feel that we are giving beyond our strength and capacity to save the injured and try to treat them. »
“Experiencing the worst of everything”
At least 26 of the 35 hospitals in the Gaza Strip are not functioning due to lack of fuel and attacks by the Israeli army.
In the north of the Gaza Strip, the Indonesian hospital was bombed several times by the Israeli army, which also ordered the evacuation of doctors and the wounded. This forced the Gaza Ministry of Health to distribute the injured to hospitals in the central and southern Gaza Strip, including the European Gaza Hospital.
The Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital is also under severe pressure, having exceeded its capacity to accommodate people injured in Israeli attacks on towns and refugee camps in the central Gaza Strip, including Deir el -Balah, Nuseirat and Bureij.
Al-Aqqad urges international health and human rights organizations to intervene to end “this hideous war” on Gaza.
“I have never in my life seen hospitals besieged and bombed, put out of service and forced to send patients out of their hospital beds before they have completed their healing process,” he says. “What we are experiencing is the worst of all. Save what remains of the population of Gaza.