JERUSALEM, December 3, 2024 (WAFA) – Palestinian and international doctors called today for the evacuation of 25,000 wounded and sick people from the Gaza Strip to hospitals in East Jerusalem.
This came in a press conference held at the Augusta Victoria Hospital in East Jerusalem, as the genocidal war waged by the Israeli occupation on the Strip continues, and most hospitals there are out of service.
The doctors said it was estimated that 25,000 people in Gaza needed life-saving medical care due to their critical conditions.
They identified three key actions to address the crisis: first, to establish safe medical evacuation corridors to secure routes for patients to hospitals in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, or in other countries; second, to end family separation by ensuring that families remain together during treatment; and third, to support the right of evacuated Palestinians to return to their homes in Gaza after receiving medical care, without having to choose between their health and their homeland.
Pediatric oncologist Khadra Salama said the suffering of children in Gaza is unimaginable, as many of them cannot access life-saving cancer treatments, which were already scarce before the aggression on the Strip.
For his part, the representative of the World Health Organization, Rick Peeperkorn, stressed the importance of facilitating humanitarian access, pointing to the "urgent need for medical supplies and the evacuation of patients, and allowing humanitarian teams to enter Gaza to provide life-saving care."
Meanwhile, the CEO of Augusta Victoria Hospital, Fadi Al-Atrash, said that the situation in Gaza is catastrophic, demanded that all Gaza patients get treatment opportunities, and the shortest and most effective way is to allow them to leave Gaza to hospitals in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.
“I feel very sad, very frustrated, and very helpless. We feel depressed because we are unable to help our people there, not because we cannot or do not have the ability, but because we are prevented from doing so,” he said, appealing to the international community and humanitarian organizations around the world to “allow us to help our people.”
A.D./ K.F.
