TEL AVIV, January 6, 2025 (WAFA) - Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHRI) said the Israeli military refuses to allow Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, to meet with a lawyer to evaluate his state and detention conditions. "Despite our urgent requests to send an attorney, the military says he's barred from lawyer visits until 10.01.2025."
The Israeli military also continues to withhold information about Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya's detention location, despite retracting their earlier claim that he isn’t being held in Israel, said PHRI in a post on X.
PHRI stressed that medical professionals are protected by international humanitarian law. ”And there's a reason for that and that is that if you attack healthcare professionals, you attack a whole society, you attack civilians who need medical attention, people with chronic illnesses and people with injuries.”
“Our numbers say that there are more than 20,000 people waiting for urgent medical evacuations. The reason is that there is no active healthcare system in Gaza and hundreds of medical professionals have lost their ability to care for their people,” said PHRI.
“More than 1000 medical professionals were killed, 230 were arrested, 130 are still held in Israeli incarceration facilities … More than 70 people have already died in Israeli Incarceration facilities. Just as a comparison, nine people died in Guantanamo in 22 years of operation. We have here more than 70 people in just a few months.”
T.R.
