Israel has arbitrarily denied 7 international aid organizations access to the Gaza Strip, which means they can no longer send in healthcare workers. This is an alarming decision that will cause significant loss of life. A 🧵
Repeated attacks on hospitals and against healthcare workers have led to a complete breakdown of Gaza’s healthcare system. Since January 2024, emergency medical teams (EMTs) have routinely entered Gaza under the World Health Organization to fill the gaps in medical care.
EMTs with my organization alone, Glia, have provided emergency trauma care, general surgery, eye surgery, obstetrics, neonatal support, & primary health care. Weekly, we see 500 patients – all internally displaced - in our field clinic, where they receive free medical treatment.
Collectively, these orgs have treated at least 15,000 patients. They coordinate delivery of medical supplies, operate hospitals, provide mental health supports, help run schools, community centres, run medical evacuations & provide other direct humanitarian aid.
Operationally, we already took a direct hit after Israel took the Rafah crossing on May 7. Before, individual orgs could send in teams up to 10 or 12 and bring with them multiple suitcases full of medicine and supplies. It wasn’t enough to address need, but it was something.
After May 7, EMTs must cross through Israel, putting it in complete control over who could enter and with what. The # of each team was whittled to roughly 3 per rotation, and supplies were no longer permitted – only one carry-on suitcase, one backpack. No medicine.
Suddenly another new rule emerged: no one of Palestinian decent was permitted to enter with an EMT. This cut off scores of highly skilled experts with a cultural awareness and language fluency from entering Gaza, further hurting collective efforts to provide aid.
And now, none of our 7 orgs are permitted to enter. This makes up about 1/3 of all EMTs. We've been given no reason for our denial. It's an escalation in Israel’s attack on healthcare in Gaza, in a genocidal war that has seen every hospital damaged and over 500 HCWs killed.
International governments must swiftly condemn this decision, and protest to Israel to have the denial be reversed. The WHO and other neutral agencies -- not Israel -- should be the ones responsible for determining which EMTs are permitted to provide medical services in Gaza.
Lives are at stake. This arbitrary denial has resulted in an immediate 30% drop in available services. If it is not reversed, and if the onslaught of violence on Gaza doesn't stop, thousands of people who would have otherwise received care from these individual orgs, will die.
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Palestinians are saying that once Israel’s genocidal war on the Gaza Strip ends, the next war begins: the healing of the physical & psychological wounds inflicted on the besieged population, esp its children, whose lives have been marked by protracted exposure to trauma. A 🧵
Even before this war, a 2023 humanitarian needs overview concluded that 495,600 children in Gaza were already in need of mental health & psychosocial services and support, but decades of occupation + siege has meant availability of mental health services have always been minimal
Children’s lives have been completely upended. Whereas kids should be exploring, playing, and steeped in imaginary play, they are instead forced to bear responsibility for family units by helping to secure basic necessities.
While I was in Gaza April-June, I witnessed the brutal effects of Israel’s gen0cide on Palestinians while also seeing the worst in the global humanitarian response. I’ve sat on this for almost two months but I’m still angry, so here goes: Fuck Fajr Scientific. A 🧵
A refresher: Israel took Rafah on May 7. Immediately that meant that the 13,000 Palestinians with life-threatening illnesses referred abroad for medical treatment could not leave, and the 2 mill+ Palestinians already trapped by a 20 year siege saw another border close. And yet...
Fajr evacuated their American/British doctors at the expense of patients and every Palestinian and int'l healthcare worker in Gaza. The moment they felt their safety was at risk, they used their national privilege to flee & then they congratulated themselves in the media for it.
There are four sounds you hear in Rafah as night falls: the incessant buzz of drones, the menacing roar of jet engines, the boom of exploding bombs.... and children's laughter.
A thread lovingly dedicated to the "rascal children of Gaza"
Despite knowing that children make up nearly 1/2 its population, the sheer # of kids in Gaza still took me by surprise. They fill the streets -- playing, running, on bikes, holding hands, selling goods, carrying toys, buckets, food, each other -- and their chatter fills the air.
Many were excited for Ramadan, a time of community spirit, ritual and bonding. They've been making decorations with whatever materials they can find, stringing them up, taking in whatever moments of joy that they can in the midst of this climate of uncertainty.
I just returned from Gaza, on a medical mission with @glia_intl. I bore witness to the human suffering caused by Israel’s ongoing war against Palestinians, but especially children. We are now in the terminal phase of a genocide that has been ongoing for 75 years.
I visited multiple hospitals and spent significant time in Rafah, an area that once housed 30,000 and is now home to over 1 million IDPs. Makeshift tents are everywhere, and refuse and rubble are piling up. Tents are now popping up in the hospitals, too, as people seek refuge.
Many hospital staff in Rafah are living in tents, close to work & away from family, providing constant care with little to no respite. They may only see their families once a week. So not only are they displaced from their homes, they are isolated from their loved ones as well.
We had such a great turnout for Community Solidarity London's rally in support of healthcare workers today.
Unfortunately we were confronted by another #FreeDumbConvoy, but most problematically, confronted by the #ldnont police. A 🧵
Our amazing speakers, like @DirkaProut seen here, spoke about the need to support the healthcare workers on the front lines, while a stationary group of #convoy protesters nearby heckled "bullshit!"
We turned our attn to the road, encouraging drivers to honk in solidarity for healthcare workers and pro-science initiatives, in an effort to take back the narrative from the #ConvoyForFreedom2022, which has filled our streets with cries for anti-science, anti-democratic action