Heartbreaking decisions have to be made, such as stopping treatment for a seven-year-old boy’s severe burns because the bandages are running out and he’s probably going to die anyway.
These American doctors and nurses have witnessed horrors and have now made it their mission to make it known in order to put pressure on their country, a major military and diplomatic supporter of Israel.
Over the past thirty years, Adam Hamawy has traveled to countries torn by war and struck by natural disasters, from the siege of Sarajevo to the earthquake in Haiti.
“But I have never seen so many civilian casualties,” said this former US army combat surgeon, in an interview with AFP after returning from a mission to the European Hospital in Gaza last month. last.
“Most of our patients were children under the age of 14,” says the 54-year-old surgeon from New Jersey.
“Whether there is a ceasefire or not, we need to get humanitarian aid. And enough to meet the demand,” Hamawy insists.
“You can donate all you want, but if the borders are not open to allow aid to come in, it’s no use,” he laments.
“Worms in the wounds”
He and other caregivers said they now feel more useful in pushing for an end to the war and for Israel to comply with international law by allowing more aid into the besieged Gaza Strip.
Israel has rejected these accusations from the international community since the start of the war, launched after the unprecedented attack carried out on its soil by Hamas on October 7.
Originally from Portland, in the northwest of the United States, Monica Johnston, a 44-year-old intensive care nurse, says she has sent lists of desperately missing equipment to White House officials and elected officials.
Gaza was his first mission.
“I don’t watch the news [télévisées]I don’t participate in anything political,” she says. But last fall, she received an email from an association asking for help. “When I hear the word ‘help,’ my ears open, my heart starts beating, and I feel like I have to do it.”
A team of 19 people, coordinated by the American-Palestinian Medical Association, left with packed suitcases.
On the ground, the obstacles are considerable: lack of personnel, serious shortage of medicines and basic hygiene products.
Monica Johnston’s voice cracks as she remembers the little boy whose burns had to be stopped in favor of patients with a better chance of survival.
“Two days later, he started getting worms in his wounds. The feeling of guilt that I caused this…” she sighs. The child was buried with his bandages, his body completely infested.
«Important»
Entire families often arrived together after bombings, with multiple generations often living in the same building, said Ammar Ghanem, a 54-year-old emergency room physician from Michigan.
For example, a cheerful 12-year-old boy who used to come and help at the hospital, attracting the admiration of the staff, suddenly disappeared for several days.
Upon his return, Ammar Ghanem learned that thirty members of the boy’s family had been killed in a bombing and that he had had to help find their bodies in the rubble.
The launch of ground operations in early May in Rafah, on the southern border with Egypt, caused a shock wave at the hospital among Palestinian caregivers, haunted by the memory of the devastating Israeli incursion into northern Gaza.
Since their return, American health workers have been grappling with survivor’s guilt as they think of their patients and colleagues left behind in what the international community calls “hell” in Gaza.
“What gives me comfort is feeling useful by telling what I witnessed,” Hamawy said. “I think that’s as important as what we did there.”
