The Voice Of Gaza

To the Gazan who must run from pillar to post for medical aid, Hussam Abu Safiya was more than just a doctor. His perseverance against the vicious odds and obstructions to serve every sick, injured, or dying Palestinian marked him out as ‘the voice of Gaza's decimated health sector'.

Against unequaled odds, Hussam Abu Safiya stood his ground with fortitude at risk to his own life. Dr. Safiya remained vigilant, available, and alert at all times. While every other medical facility had been bombed out by the murderous Israel Defence Force (IDF), Safiya stayed unmoved in what, then, was the last station where health care was available.

Since the Israeli army launched its war on Gaza, Safiya refused to leave the coastal enclave or even evacuate his house and hospital.

It broke him to see the last remaining hospital in northern Gaza smashed before which, it remained the only medical space providing essential care to children and intensive care patients. Patience and rigor profiled his outlook to a point where he had emerged as a Palestinian icon. He was, by then, a household name because enunciated "humanitarian" positions and obligations to sustain treatment of the wounded and sick. That also became his raison d'etre for serving in the dangerous war terrain of Northern Gaza.

The vitality of his binding to administer to the desperately sick, earned him the wrath of the Israeli army. He was frequently threatened but stubbornly rejected orders to leave the area and save himself and his family. After all, he had become a friend and virtual life-line gained the love and respect his people had for thousands of displaced people. To maximize his capacities to serve the people, he went out of the way to treat people visiting the wounded and other patients, even with the extremely limited resources.

In late October, the Israeli army stormed the hospital of ‘Abu Safiya’, as he is known to most people. They stormed the hospital and then the military released him. By then he had to confront the appalling fact that the Israel army killed his son, Ibrahim. He still rigidly wedged himself to his "humanitarian mission". He gradually moved from one hospital to another to treat children and newborn babies.

Seeing his defiant resistance, Israeli forces stormed the hospital and took him into custody. The Director General of the Palestinian Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip reported that Israel had played a deceiving hoax by promising medical staff they would shift them to the Indonesian hospital. Instead the entire staff was transferred into, and that included Dr. Safiya.

They singled out Dr. Safiya for cruelty to avenge his defiance. He was beaten with batons and sticks after being forced to take off his clothes and be dressed in prisoner clothes. Abu Safiya was last seen in Sde Teiman Prison with signs of beating and torture on his body. The Israeli occupation denied his arrest initially, and then admitted it. The last photo of Abu Safiya showed him defiantly and boldly walking alone towards a row of Israeli tanks that had amassed outside the facility.

They followed that by using him as a human shield. His whereabouts are wrapped in secrecy and reports of his situation are confused by, sometimes, conflicting and dual narratives. It is reported that the good doctor is held either in the Ofer Prison in Israel, or, more likely, in the notorious Sde Teiman detention camp. His whereabouts remain unknown.

His wife, Albina, also a Russian Doctor, is obviously tormented and anxious and has said she is certain that the Israeli army tortured her husband even though he was wounded." She added: “My husband did not commit any crime to be arrested this way. All he cared about was helping the wounded and sick and saving their lives, despite the lack of the necessary medical capabilities for that, at a time when Israel continues to target everything in northern Gaza."

Although Dr Safiya specialized in pediatrics, he fervently served patients with just about any category of injury or illness. He was entirely selfless having done all he could to save the lives of the injured. Imagine this level of cruelty. He was a pediatrician but when he saw injured people whose limbs were torn to pieces, and because there were not enough surgeons to accommodate all these cases, he volunteered to perform surgeries and help people, his wife conveyed.

After all this selfless work, all that the army could accuse Dr. Safiya of was that he was yet another terrorist operator dressed under the guise of a Doctor. In their now-standard rationalization, the Israeli army pretends it was compelled to carry out the operation in the hospital area to arrest "at least 240 Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists." Nonsensical.

The family has called on the international community, human rights organisations, and the World Health Organisation to pressure Israel to release her husband and allow him to return to work "because Gaza needs him. He is the doctor who treated thousands in difficult conditions and with limited capabilities."

Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-I) report that Israeli authorities have barred him from seeing a lawyer –an essential right that prisoners must be provided. This urgent demand stems from fears that Dr. Safiya has not been seen publicly since his arrest during an Israeli forces raid late last month".

The request to allow him to meet a lawyer is also to assess Abu Safiya's condition and the circumstances of his detention. Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor has conveyed public reports that Dr Abu Safiya’s health has deteriorated due to the torture he endured during his detention.

Dr. Safiya’s situation has now attracted international attention. Hundreds of people took to social media using the hashtag #FreeDrHussamAbuSafiyeh to protest Israel's capture and detention of Abu Safiya, as well as calling for Israel to be held accountable for attacks on hospital facilities and medics.

A group of pro-Palestinian protestors gathered in Toronto to demand the release Abu Safiya. The protesters carried banners reading "Health for Gaza, stop the genocide" and "Healthcare is not a crime." They also demanded an arms embargo and the severing of diplomatic relations with Israel.

A Palestinian Forum in Britain (PFB) has called for a “massive protest” against Israel’s detention of Dr. Safiya and the destruction of Gaza’s healthcare facilities. Their banners called out: In New York, demonstrators, including health workers, demanded Dr Safiya’s release "Not another child, Not another hospital," "Gaza forever” and "We are sick from genocide.”

Amnesty International demanded that Israeli authorities release Dr Safiya expressing extreme concern over his well being. Human Rights defenders warn of the grave risk to his life, following patterns of deliberate killings and deaths under torture previously suffered by other doctors and medical staff arrested from Gaza since October 2023.

The detention of Dr Abu Safiya must be understood within the context of Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza, which has persisted for nearly 15 months. His arrest, torture, and potential execution form part of a broader strategy aimed at destroying the Palestinian people in Gaza — both physically and psychologically — and breaking their will.

This strategy includes not only the deliberate destruction of the health sector and the disruption of medical staff operations, particularly in northern Gaza, but also an attack on the symbolic and humanitarian role represented by the likes of Dr Safiya. Immediate steps are called for to prevent forced displacement, ensure the return of residents, release arbitrarily detained Palestinians, and facilitate the urgent entry of life-saving humanitarian aid into Gaza without obstacles.

According to international humanitarian law (IHL), health establishments and units, including hospitals, should not be attacked. This protection extends to the wounded and sick as well as to medical staff and means of transport. The rule has few exceptions.

The ICRC (International Red Cross) affirms that “Respecting and Protecting Health Care in Armed Conflicts and in Situations not covered by International Humanitarian Law In times of armed conflict, international humanitarian law (IHL) provides rules to protect access to health care. These rules bind States and non-State armed groups. In situations that do not reach the threshold of armed conflict only international human rights law (IHRL) and domestic law apply.

Personnel engaging in medical tasks must always be respected and protected, unless they commit, outside of their humanitarian function, acts that are harmful to the enemy. The wounded and sick under their care remain protected even if the medical personnel themselves lose their protection.

Ranjan Solomon is an activist and a columnist. The views expressed here are the writer’s own.

Cover Photograph: In happier times - Dr Hussam Abu Safiya with his son