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Rapid Responses: Rapid Responses published:
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The situation in Gaza
- Brian H Fisher (9 January 2009)
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ICRC and UNRWA hindered by Israeli army
- Hind Khalifeh (9 January 2009)
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Brian H Fisher, Retired GP and Chair of Socialist Health Association 100 Erlanger Rd SE14 5TH
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6 1 09 Dear Editor The situation in Gaza has a particular relevance and impact for clinicians everywhere. Despite Israel increasing aid since the attacks on Gaza began, the humanitarian crisis is deepening despite the denials of Israel’s Foreign Secretary Ms Livni. There are ghastly responsibilities for this medical crisis on both sides. The Gazan authorities have apparently refused to allow injured people through the Erez crossing to be transported to Israeli hospitals although beds have been made available for them. Similar restrictions have been asserted by Egypt. [1] However, Israel’s responsibilities are far greater, in our opinion. Prof Richard Falk, United Nations special rapporteur for human rights in the Occupied Territories is clear: Earlier Israeli actions, specifically the complete sealing off of entry and exit to and from the Gaza Strip, have led to severe shortages of medicine and fuel (as well as food), resulting in the inability of ambulances to respond to the injured, the inability of hospitals to adequately provide medicine or necessary equipment for the injured, and the inability of Gaza's besieged doctors and other medical workers to sufficiently treat the victims. The Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip represent severe and massive violations of international humanitarian law as defined in the Geneva Conventions, both in regard to the obligations of an Occupying Power and in the requirements of the laws of war. Those violations include:
Certainly the rocket attacks against civilian targets in Israel are unlawful. But that illegality does not give rise to any Israeli right, neither as the Occupying Power nor as a sovereign state, to violate international humanitarian law and commit war crimes against humanity in its response [2] We call for: - The UN to pass an emergency resolution to condemn Israel’s serious violations and to develop new approaches to providing real protection for the Palestinian people. - A boycott of Israel’s academic institutions - Clinicians with relevant skills to offer help to Gaza. Please contact Greta Berlin: iristulip@gmail.com or daisydozy@gmail.com - The United Nations Agencies to provide urgent humanitarian aid and safe shelters for Gazans who have been displaced and those living in threatened areas; - The ICRC to double its efforts to ensure humanitarian access for civilians and ensure tending to the urgent needs for medicines and water; Yours sincerely, Dr BH Fisher MBE
1 Israeli Physicians for Human Rights: Wounded and a Catch 22. 30 December 2008. Hadas Ziv hadas@pht.org.il 2 http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090112/falk?rel=hp_currently Competing interests: None declared |
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Hind Khalifeh, Clinical Training Fellow, General Adult Psychiatry Department of Mental Health Sciences, UCL
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In recent days, both the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the UNRWA reported specific incidents where the Israeli army had either hindered their attempts to evacuate wounded civilians, or directly attacked their medical and aid staff and facilities- resulting in the deaths of civilians and UN aid personnel. The ICRC reported that, on the 7th of January 2009, an Israeli army unit made it impossible for them to safely evacuate wounded and exhausted civilians in the neighbourhood of Zaytun in Gaza. The civilians had been discovered by ICRC personnel in houses shelled by Israel earlier that week, and included four starving children who were found next to their dead mothers- in a house that contained twelve dead bodies in total. (ref: http://www.icrc.org/Web/Eng/siteeng0.nsf/html/palestine-news-080109). An Israeli army unit, stationed only 80 metres away, refused ICRC ambulances access to evacuate the wounded, and demanded that ICRC personnel leave the neighbourhood. The ICRC were forced to evacuate 18 wounded, 12 others who were exhausted and two dead bodies on a donkey cart. "This is a shocking incident," said Pierre Wettach, the ICRC's head of delegation for Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. "The Israeli military must have been aware of the situation but did not assist the wounded. Neither did they make it possible for us or the Palestine Red Crescent to assist the wounded." This incident is a clear violation of international humanitarian law to care for and evacuate the wounded. On the 6th of January, shells from two Israeli tanks hit an URWA school in Jabalya camp, where hundreds of civilians were sheltering from the continued Israeli assault, killing 40 civilians and injuring 50 others. UN officials in Gaza stated that the school was clearly marked with a UN flag, that the GPS co-ordinates had been provided to the Israeli army, and that Israeli army had full knowledge of the fact that the schools were being used to shelter a large number of internally displaced civilians. Initially the Israeli army claimed that they were responding to Hamas militants firing from within the compound, but these claims were later retracted- as reported by UNRWA officials: "I have been authorised to say that in private briefings with diplomats, the Israeli army has admitted that the rockets from Jabalya (two days ago) came from outside the UNRWA school compound, not from inside it. Therefore the allegations against a neutral UN human development organization were entirely baseless. This increases pressure for an independent investigation. " (http://www.un.org/unrwa/news/statements/gaza_crisis/chris_gaza_crisis.html) On the 9th of January. The UNRWA was forced to suspend its aid operation in Gaza because "Our installations have been hit, our workers have been killed in spite of the fact that the Israeli authorities have the co- ordinates of our facilities and that all our movements are co-ordinated with the Israeli army." This followed an incident where one person had been killed and two hurt when a fork-lift truck on a UN aid mission came under Israeli tank fire at Gaza's Erez crossing. The UN said the movements of the truck had been co-ordinated and cleared with the Israeli military. "We have suspended our operations in Gaza until the Israeli authorities can guarantee our safety and security," said Unrwa spokesman Chris Gunness. Under international humanitarian law, armies must do everything possible to search for, collect and evacuate the wounded. Attacks on medical staff, hospitals and vehicles are prohibited. The above incidents are clear violations of international humanitarian law, reported by reliable, neutral humanitarian organisations. Israel continues to deny access to international aid agency personnel, human rights monitors and journalists, so that numerous other reports of human rights violations cannot be investigated. Reporting in the mainstream media of these incidents is almost always followed by statements from Israeli official spokespersons attempting to justify the incidents in terms of self-defence, or in terms of ignorance of the likelihood of excessive civilian casualties. Later retractions, as in the case of the UNRWA school shelling above, are rarely reported on - preventing a coherent and clear account of probable violations of humanitarian law. The medical community needs to call for an immediate ceasefire that would prevent further deaths and injuries amongst innocent civilians, and allow investigations into potential humanitarian law abuses and war crimes. Competing interests: None declared |
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