This report opens a small window into the crisis inside the collapsed hospitals of the Gaza Strip. It represents a summary of a group of audio and text messages, video clips and photos sent by surgeon Bakr Abu Safiya from Jabalia over a period of 6 days last week, at the request of the American newspaper The Washington Post.
The report – prepared by Heba Farouk Mahfouz and Claire Parker from the newspaper’s office in Cairo – begins on October 13, the eighth day of the ongoing Israeli attack on northern Gaza. The surgery department at Al-Awda Hospital in Jabalia was full, and the hospital halls remained crowded with more. The number of seriously injured patients continues to increase.
Israel had ordered doctors to evacuate Al-Awda Hospital and two other hospitals a few days ago, but Abu Safiya (63 years old), who was born and raised in Gaza, refused to leave and remained in the north throughout the war, mostly away from his family.
Fighting in northern Gaza had ebbed and flowed over the past year, but the Israeli army, after a period of relative calm over the summer, launched a major offensive on October 6, besieging Jabalia and striking targets in what it said was an attempt to eradicate Hamas activists. ) and the destruction of military infrastructure.
Abu Safiya said that the small armed Israeli drones carried out “the work of 10 soldiers at a time,” shooting and killing people in the streets, and rescue workers were often unable to reach them, because moving anywhere had become dangerous.
The report indicated that Israeli forces prevented any humanitarian aid from entering northern Gaza during the first two weeks of October, and even the small amounts of food that entered did not reach Jabalia – as relief organizations say – as for the staff of Al-Awda Hospital, which numbered about 120 individuals. He sleeps in the hospital and shares meager dishes of rice with patients and their families.
October 14
Abu Safiya says that on this day he ran from one surgery to another, and he only had a moment to catch his breath, because “many massacres took place in Jabalia and Beit Lahia. We open two stomachs at the same time. I go to stop the bleeding and leave the rest to the assistant, and I go to The other room. May God protect us.”
October 15
Major surgeries continued throughout the night until 4 a.m. on Tuesday. “After a year of war, displacement and Israeli attacks on Gaza’s health system, the besieged medical workers are going beyond such formalities,” says Abu Safiya, who is trained as a general surgeon.
I pray to God that today will be calm, because there are no more blood units left and no empty beds in the hospital, and the medical staff does not have any energy.
That night, Abu Safiya worked – as he says – as a vascular surgeon, a thoracic surgeon, and a urinary tract surgeon. He added in a voice heavy with exhaustion, “Injuries to children, women, and the elderly. It was very difficult. More than you can imagine.”
Abu Safiya and his colleagues sat down to eat around 5 a.m., snatched a few hours of sleep on a bed in a small staff room, and when it was time to return to work at 9:15 a.m., he said, “I pray that today will be quiet, because there are no more blood units.” There are no empty beds left in the hospital, and the medical staff does not have any energy.” Indeed, the day passed more easily than the previous day.
Abu Safiya went to Kamal Adwan Hospital, about two miles away, to help and check on a teenage girl who needed “massive surgery” on her heart, chest and shoulder. Then he returned, and conditions were getting worse. Food supplies were dwindling, he said, as was fuel.
October 16
Abu Safiya said he heard explosions and occasional gunshots nearby on this day, and there was a severe shortage of gauze and towels to bandage wounds, and medicines had also run out. Abu Safiya said in an audio message – In it Hearing an Israeli march flying – “We have no alternatives to them and no place to buy from.”
Although Israel allowed some trucks carrying food aid to enter northern Gaza as of October 14 – according to UN and Israeli officials – after an American request to increase the flow of humanitarian aid, Israeli forces did not allow any supplies to enter Jabalia this month. According to Louise Waterridge, spokeswoman for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).
Abu Safiya said that they are outside the hospital and in great trouble, because they are trapped in their homes without food or water, noting that his wife and two sons are now living in a tent in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, and he has not seen them for nearly a year, but he considers it his duty to continue his work. , he says.
October 17
On Thursday, Abu Safiya was only able to send a text message, in which he said that he was running from one operating room to another to perform surgeries, saying, “I have had 5 surgeries, and I have 5 more,” but on Friday dawn, he sent another short text message saying, “Now 14 major surgeries were performed.
In the early hours of Saturday morning, several Israeli shells fell on the hospital – according to health officials and international relief workers – and the association that runs the hospital said in a statement that a crew member was “sustained with very serious injuries,” and requested the provision of supplies, personnel and protection.
The Director General of Gaza Hospitals, Munir Al-Bursh, told the newspaper on Saturday morning that doctors are afraid for their patients. Communicating with anyone at Al Awda Hospital became almost impossible in the days that followed.
On Monday evening, the newspaper’s correspondent was able to reach the hospital director, Muhammad Salha, who said that the Israeli attack on Saturday destroyed the facility’s water tanks and one of the ambulances. Salha added that the ambulance was “completely surrounded” and had only 3 days left. Fuel to operate it, and Abu Safiya confirmed that it was fine and working as usual.