In early March 2020, I was privileged to join a ten-person medical delegation to Gaza organized by the Washington state chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility. Several among our group have long histories and deep personal ties with Gaza, which has been subjected to a harsh Israeli blockade for fourteen years. The staff of our host organization, the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme, worked tirelessly to tailor our daily schedules to our specialties and interests. We were provided with personal interpreters and transportation. In my capacity as a medical physicist, I visited six hospitals, where I left behind textbooks and electronic files of my medical imaging teaching materials. I met and spoke with hospital administrators, medical directors, radiologists, radiology technologists, and other medical professionals.
Dr. Mahu Ayyad is Medical Director of the Ahli Arab hospital, which is supported by the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem. He explained: the five-year survival for a newly-diagnosed breast cancer patient in Gaza is 50%. In Israel, just a few miles away, the five-year survival is 85%. There is no radiotherapy in Gaza. Chemotherapy is in short supply, creating conditions in which a patient is often unable to complete a full course of treatment. Appeals to cross the checkpoint to receive care in Israel or the West Bank are routinely delayed or simply denied. These patients suffer and die. I wonder, Israel, how is this anything other than depraved indifference to human life? What possible security do you realize by denying a breast cancer patient the standard of care for her disease?
Radiologists at the Nasser Hospital described the many difficulties they face. There are no radiation dosimeters in Gaza and thus no means to measure radiation exposure of patients and radiology personnel. There is no nuclear medicine in Gaza and no tests based on radioactive tracers. Israel, you would not allow even one of your technologists to participate in a fluoroscopy procedure without wearing a proper, calibrated dosimeter. Of course, you know that the isotopes used in nuclear medicine cannot be fabricated into weapons. With no scientific rationale to support your blockade of these medical necessities, what sense are we to make of it?
At the Al Awda Hospital, a fluoroscopy system sat dormant awaiting a $3,000 circuit board, the delivery of which Israel had blocked for months. This is common in Gaza. At the Al Quds Red Crescent Hospital, a new CT scanner was delivered, but the workstation that enables its advanced cardiac applications has been held up at by the blockade. Israel, you are well aware that the fluoroscopy board is specific for that imaging system and could not be used for anything else. And the workstation is specific to that Philips CT scanner. Your blockade is capricious; it is malicious. When applied to medical devices and supplies, to isolation of physicians and support staff from their international professional networks, and to technical support from equipment providers, your blockade serves no military or security purpose.
The consequences of the Israeli blockade of Gaza go far beyond these stories and touch every aspect of life. The UN has declared that Gaza would be unlivable by 2020. The water is unsafe to drink, sewage is untreated, food supplies are inadequate. The Israeli human rights organization Gisha reports that unemployment in Gaza is roughly 50%. Teenagers in Gaza have endured three wars; the psychological effects of sustained trauma are widespread.
In your collective soul, Israel, do you recognize in the suffering and trauma created by your violent blockade something of your own people’s history of persecution? Will you allow those elements of shared history to open a path to compassion?
“I wonder, Israel, how is this anything other than depraved indifference to human life? What possible security do you realize by denying a breast cancer patient the standard of care for her disease?”
Let’s collect all the answers we’ve already heard from the graduates of Hasbara U:
It’s good to smite your enemies.
Denying a breast cancer patient treatment keeps Hamas off-guard.
Gaza and Israel are separate countries, what does this have to do with Israel?
If Hamas didn’t spend so much money on terrorism they could buy more medicine.
The Palestinians have been offered peace many times, they don’t want it.
The Arabs have their own countries, Israel is the only tiny state for the Jews.
Did I miss one?
This is so sad, and it is unfortunate, that this endless pain and suffering could be easily alleviated by the very nations that keep preaching about democracy, human rights, and lecture other nations about not adhering to what they preaching about. The nations that aid and enable this heartless and cruel nation, who keeps inflicting the suffering, and shows their spite by refusing to clear urgently needed medicines, vaccinations, and medical equipment. There is no doubt the lives of the Palestinians are not of any consequence to those who have mastered the art of playing victim, all their policies and actions point out to indifference to the plight of the occupied and loss of lives, and nothing, not even a pandemic, will make hearts of stone, want to act in a more humane way.
They want the Palestinians to perish. No doubt.
American dollars at work.
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https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/bernie-sanders-slams-israel-for-sending-covid-vaccines-to-allies-before-palestinians-1.9567856
“Bernie Sanders Slams Israel for Sending COVID Vaccines Abroad While Palestinians ‘Still Waiting'” Haaretz, Feb. 24/21, by Ben Samuels.
WASHINGTON – “Senator Bernie Sanders slammed the Israeli government for distributing COVID-19 vaccines to countries with which it has bolstered relations in recent years before sending vaccines to Palestinians.
“‘As the occupying power, Israel is responsible for the health of all the people under its control,’ Sanders tweeted. ‘It is outrageous that Netanyahu would use spare vaccines to reward his foreign allies while so many Palestinians in the occupied territories are still waiting.’
“Israel will send a few thousand doses of vaccines to several countries with which it has boosted its ties in recent years – the Czech Republic, Hungary, Guatemala and Honduras. Israel is also expected to send additional vaccines to health care workers in the West Bank, as well as another unnamed country, as confirmed by the Prime Minister’s Office.
“’In light of the successful vaccination campaign in Israel, the leading country in the world in inoculating the population, Israel has received many requests from the countries of the world to assist with the supply of vaccines,’ the Prime Minister’s Office statement read.
“The Kan public broadcaster reported that a total of roughly 100,000 Moderna vaccines are being shipped to some 15 allies, as well as a number of countries in Africa that have strong or budding ties with Israel.
“Israel has shared just 2,000 doses of vaccines with the Palestinian Authority to inoculate West Bank medical workers. Otherwise, the Palestinians have struggled to procure their own vaccines. (cont’d)
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“Sanders is the latest Democratic lawmaker to voice concern about Israel’s vaccine policy toward the Palestinians, following several members of Congress. Representative Jamaal Bowman, a first-term congressman from New York, sent a letter to Israel’s acting consul general in New York, Israel Nitzan, questioning why Israeli settlers in the West Bank were receiving vaccines while Palestinians were not. ‘I was heartened to read that the Israeli government has recently agreed to transfer 5,000 doses of the vaccine to Palestinians to immunize front-line medical workers, but the entire population in the West Bank and Gaza must also be covered,’ Bowman wrote earlier this month.
“The State Department recently said that it welcomes reports to facilitate vaccine distribution but noted that ‘we believe it’s important for Palestinians to achieve increased access to COVID vaccines in the weeks ahead’ and ‘we know we can’t put the scourge of COVID-19 behind us until the world has access to these same safe and effective vaccines.’
“Guatemala moved its Israel embassy to Jerusalem in 2018, while Honduras has announced its intention to move their embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. The Czech Republic has said it plans to open a ‘diplomatic office’ in Jerusalem. In 2019, Hungary opened a ‘trade office’ in the city as well.
What a pack of lies.
It is the PA and the Palestinian Health Ministry that blocks transfers to Israeli hospitals and the import of needed medical supplies – all due to Abbas’ pissing contests with Israel and Hamas.
And there is nothing needed in Gaza that cannot enter through Egypt. Patients as well can pass through Egypt and have access the to hospitals of the entire Arab world.