[News] Israel’s war machine can’t break the steadfastness of Palestinian health workers

[Anti-Imperialist News]

peoplesdispatch.org
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/11/22/israels-war-machine-cant-break-the-steadfastness-of-palestinian-health-workers/>
Israel’s war machine can’t break the steadfastness of Palestinian health
workers
Peoples Health Dispatch
November 22, 2023
------------------------------

Staff of Al-Awda hospital honors their fallen colleagues.

Al-Awda hospital in Jabalya refugee camp, is one of the latest health
institutions in Palestine to be directly targeted by Israeli occupation
forces. On Tuesday, November 21, at least three health workers were killed,
and more were injured during one iteration of the attack. Among the dead is
Ziad Al-Tatari, a neonatologist. It would seem particularly vicious to kill
pediatricians as children continue to comprise the majority of the victim
toll in Gaza. Yet Israel’s systematic attack against healthcare in
Palestine makes it less surprising than it should be.

The surprise might be dimmed, but the shock lingers even for those who have
experienced the impact of the occupation on the Palestinian health system
firsthand, like Dr. Mads Gilbert.

During a discussion
<https://www.nocoldwar.org/news/webinar-urgent-medical-crisis-in-gaza>
coordinated by No Cold War, the People’s Health Movement, and Viva Salud,
Gilbert, who has worked in Palestine on and off for decades, described how
incredible it seemed that the world chose to look away as Israel repeatedly
attacked Palestinians’ right to health day after day.

He emphasized how much recognition health workers in Palestine deserve
after working under occupation for 75 years. Their discipline and dignity
in the face of the most horrific attacks are a living example of
Palestinian *sumud*, or steadfastness, leaving no doubt that the health
workers will remain as long as there are patients in the hospitals and
people in the refugee camps.

The calm and dignity that such steadfastness combines were present in the
voices of the Palestinian speakers at the discussion. When one looks at the
rate of physical destruction of health infrastructure in Gaza — with only a
quarter of hospitals still functioning, caved-in walls and floors, and no
electricity — it can be difficult to imagine how it will be possible to
rebuild it.

The health workers in Palestine, however, remain confident that it will
happen. “Together, we will rebuild all the hospitals that have been
destroyed in Palestine,” assured Aed Yaghi, the director of the Palestinian
Medical Relief Society. “And I think we will live to witness one day,
Palestinian Independence Day.“

Palestinian hospitals, health centers, health workers, and patients are not
collateral damage as the Israeli occupation forces try to paint it. The
determination to destroy them is part of the strategy to eliminate all
traces of a social security network for Palestinians, making it impossible
for people to return home, said Mustafa Barghouti from the Palestinian
National Council.

Israel’s attacks following October 7 have been particularly violent. So
violent, in fact, that Barghouti warned that Palestine is now facing three
parallel war crimes: genocide, ethnic cleansing, and collective punishment.
The extent of the violence of the Israeli occupation forces has escalated
so much that relatives who had lived through the Nakba are talking of the
current situation as its second iteration, warned Yaghi.

What we are witnessing should stir everyone, but we have to be careful that
our reaction is not reduced to pity or charity. “Pity is colonial,” said
Gilbert. What the health workers and the people of Palestine deserve
instead is solidarity in the sense defined by Samora Machel — “mutual aid
between forces fighting for the same objective“ — according to Gilbert.

“The two most beautiful words I know in Norwegian are love and solidarity.
What we are witnessing today is an attempt to deny them,” Gilbert said.
Efforts to stifle people’s campaigns for a ceasefire and respect for basic
human rights in Palestine have not proven to be very successful, as public
outrage against the indiscriminate destruction of the Gaza Strip has become
more pronounced all over the world.

On the other hand, solidarity initiatives with Palestine have grown over
the past weeks, including among health workers. The younger generation of
health workers is particularly vocal about the necessity of standing up to
those who would like to turn hospitals into military targets. Their
protests have spanned the globe from Indonesia to Norway to South Africa.
In Cape Town, several hundred health workers picketed
<https://www.groundup.org.za/article/health-workers-picket-for-palestine-outside-red-cross-childrens-hospital/>
outside the Red Cross Children’s Hospital on Tuesday, reiterating the
demand for an immediate ceasefire and an end to the targeting of health
personnel and infrastructure.

In some cases, instead of being heard by their governments and leaders of
professional associations, health workers have faced censorship and
harassment for their advocacy, as Rupa Marya from the Do No Harm coalition
described happening in the US. The attempt by some health workers to build
solidarity with Palestine has been followed by what Marya described as a
“vicious backlash against the health workers,” one that could not be
compared to anything she had seen previously when doctors and other health
workers would adopt a more political stance.
*Read more: The Israeli attack on Palestinian health workers in Gaza and
the failure of the American Medical Association
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/11/16/the-israeli-attack-on-palestinian-health-workers-in-gaza-and-the-failure-of-the-american-medical-association/>*

Despite opposition by the establishment, health workers in the US are not
giving up their fight to unmask the “horrific dark charade”, as Marya put
it, that is being broadcast by corporate media. Their pursuit is mirrored
in other countries of the Global North as well. In Belgium, health workers
and volunteers from Medicine for the People (MPLP) are organizing vigils
and participating in community events every day, making sure that the
largest possible number of people hears about the war on Palestine.

Hanne Bosselaers, a general practitioner in one of MPLP’s health centers in
Molenbeek, pointed out that speaking to the community by drawing from
personal experience was the best way to draw people into the solidarity
movements. Bosselaers worked in Al-Awda’s centers earlier in her career:
according to her, lived experience, rather than statistics, is the best way
to sensitize people about the Palestinian cause and stop Israeli impunity.

At this point, the importance of mounting pressure cannot be overstated.
“Don’t just sit and praise — act,” Gilbert said. What the health workers in
Palestine are showing to the world is a “teaching experience on resilience,
on a culture that stands on different values than our capitalist health
systems,” he pointed out. Recognizing and incorporating these values into
the practice of solidarity movements is paramount for strengthening them
and giving them the tools to truly stand with Palestine.

*People’s Health Dispatch* *is a fortnightly bulletin published by
the* *People’s
Health Movement* <http://www.phmovement.org/> *and **Peoples Dispatch**.
For more articles and to subscribe to People’s Health Dispatch, click*
*here* <https://peoples-health-dispatch.ghost.io/>.
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