Patients in Gaza hospitals beg for food and water as they lie ‘waiting to die,’ WHO official says

Patients in Gaza hospitals beg for food and water as they lie ‘waiting to die,’ WHO official says
Patients and internally displaced people are pictured at Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City on November 10, 2023, amid ongoing battles between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
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Updated 18 January 2024
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Patients in Gaza hospitals beg for food and water as they lie ‘waiting to die,’ WHO official says

Patients in Gaza hospitals beg for food and water as they lie ‘waiting to die,’ WHO official says
  • Sean Casey paints grim picture of broken healthcare system amid surge in number of wounded and continuing restrictions on delivery of humanitarian aid
  • He calls for a ceasefire as only way to prevent more injuries and allow the sick and wounded in hospitals to receive proper treatment

NEW YORK CITY: More than 60,000 Palestinians injured so far during the war in Gaza, and the more than 200 people added to their ranks each day, not only continue to be deprived of adequate medical care, they are also in desperate need of food and water to survive, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.

The UN agency painted a grim picture of a healthcare system brought to its knees amid the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation in the territory and continuing restrictions on access for humanitarian aid and healthcare workers, particularly to areas north of Rafah where “every movement throughout the Gaza Strip requires coordination. Every movement presents risks and logistical challenges.”

Sean Casey, the WHO’s emergency medical team coordinator, called for a ceasefire as the only way to properly address the new “level of desperation” in the crisis, adding that anything short of an end to the hostilities simply leaves humanitarian groups “addressing needs on a day-by-day basis.”

He added: “Every day we’re trying to play catch up with the 60,000 injuries and the 200-plus new injuries that are occurring every day, and a health system that is quickly losing its capacity.

“So what I would ask anybody who has any ability to change this dynamic is (for) a cessation of hostilities so that the injuries can stop and the aid can reach the people who need it the most. But short of that: improving access, simplifying access.”

Casey was speaking to reporters at the UN headquarters in New York following a five-week visit to Gaza. During the final week of his trip, he said his team tried “every single day, for seven days, to deliver fuel and supplies to Gaza City in the north, and every day those requests for coordinated movements were denied.

“That prevents us from bringing medicines to people who need them, from bringing water for dialysis machines to people who were sitting there waiting for care that can be provided. So access and safety are the most important.”

Casey spoke of the dire situation he saw during visits to Al-Shifa hospital and six of the 16 other hospitals that are the only ones that remain “minimally” functional out of the 36 that previously provided care in Gaza.

“Every time I went to the hospitals I saw evidence, again and again, of the simultaneous humanitarian catastrophe that’s unfolding, every day getting worse and worse, and the collapse of the health system day by day, with hospitals closing, health workers fleeing, casualties continuing to stream in, lack of access to medicines and medical supplies, and a lack of access to fuel to run hospital generators to keep the lights on, to keep the machines running,” he said.

This is happening alongside a “dramatic humanitarian catastrophe” in which “truckloads and busloads” of people continue to flee each day with all of their belongings to southern Gaza, where shelters made of “plastic sheeting and a couple of pieces of wood on the street now become their new home.”

The challenges posed by access restrictions imposed on humanitarian workers and limitations on their movement continue to hobble efforts by the WHO to deliver desperately needed medicines to hospitals that are still open, and to deploy additional doctors and nurses to help meet the “enormous demand of trauma patients, but also patients with every other clinical presentation that you would normally see,” such as “the pregnant women who still need antenatal care and who still need to deliver, and the people who require dialysis.”

Although Casey was able to visit Al-Shifa hospital, for 12 days his team was unable to deliver to it any food or medical supplies. With more than 700 beds, it is the most important healthcare facility in Gaza but has been “brought down to become a trauma-stabilization point,” he said.

“The whole hospital was filled with tens of thousands of displaced persons, living in the operating theaters, in the corridors, in the stairways. And the emergency department was seeing hundreds of patients a day, mostly trauma, with only a handful, literally five or six doctors or nurses, to care for all of those people.”

Casey said he saw “patients on the floor, so many you could barely move without stepping on somebody’s hands or feet.”

He spoke of patients at Al-Ahli hospital, also in northern Gaza, lying on church pews “basically waiting to die” in a hospital with no fuel, no power, no water, very little in the way of medical supplies and only a handful of staff remaining to take care of them.

Further south, at Al-Nasr medical complex in Khan Younes, only about 30 percent of staff remain, Casey said, and the facility is at about 200 percent of its bed capacity, with patients crammed into corridors and lying on floors. In its burns unit, one physician provides care for about 100 patients.

“So its a really horrifying situation in the hospitals,” he added.

He also described the challenges faced every day in attempts to organize aid convoys to deliver desperately needed fuel and relief supplies, and to send more surgeons, doctors and nurses to the hospitals “to try to save life and limb, to avoid unnecessary amputations, to treat the many children that I saw with terrible shrapnel injuries and gunshot wounds, and to establish field hospitals.”

Rafah, on Gaza’s border with Egypt, now hosts about 1 million displaced people, an almost four-fold increase on the 270,000 that were there just a few weeks ago.

The area “doesn’t have the healthcare infrastructure to deal with this huge influx of internally displaced persons,” Casey said. “It doesn’t have the physical space to host these people. They’re on the sidewalks, on the street.”

He said the WHO is working to set up additional field hospitals and provide more healthcare workers to replace those who were forced to flee for their lives, and to meet the significantly increased burden of care created by injuries and illnesses caused by the conflict and the atrocious living conditions. Displaced people who have lost most of their possessions are forced to sleep in tents with little or no access to the basic requirements for life, including food, clean water, heat and proper shelter, exposing them to infectious diseases, he added.


At least 100,000 bodies in Syrian mass grave, US advocacy group head says

At least 100,000 bodies in Syrian mass grave, US advocacy group head says
Updated 17 December 2024
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At least 100,000 bodies in Syrian mass grave, US advocacy group head says

At least 100,000 bodies in Syrian mass grave, US advocacy group head says
  • Assad and his father Hafez, who preceded him as president and died in 2000, are accused by Syrians, rights groups and other governments of widespread extrajudicial killings, including mass executions within the country’s notorious prison system

WASHINGTON: The head of a US-based Syrian advocacy organization on Monday said that a mass grave outside of Damascus contained the bodies of at least 100,000 people killed by the former government of ousted President Bashar Assad.
Mouaz Moustafa, speaking to Reuters in a telephone interview from Damascus, said the site at al Qutayfah, 25 miles (40 km) north of the Syrian capital, was one of five mass graves that he had identified over the years.
“One hundred thousand is the most conservative estimate” of the number of bodies buried at the site, said Moustafa, head of the Syrian Emergency Task Force. “It’s a very, very extremely almost unfairly conservative estimate.”
Moustafa said that he is sure there are more mass graves than the five sites, and that along with Syrians victims included US and British citizens and other foreigners.
Reuters was unable to confirm Moustafa’s allegations.
Hundreds of thousands of Syrians are estimated to have been killed since 2011, when Assad’s crackdown on protests against his rule grew into a full-scale civil war.
Assad and his father Hafez, who preceded him as president and died in 2000, are accused by Syrians, rights groups and other governments of widespread extrajudicial killings, including mass executions within the country’s notorious prison system.
Assad repeatedly denied that his government committed human rights violations and painted his detractors as extremists.
Syria’s UN Ambassador Koussay Aldahhak did not immediately respond to a request for comment. He assumed the role in January — while Assad was still in power — but told reporters last week that he was awaiting instructions from the new authorities and would “keep defending and working for the Syrian people.”
Moustafa arrived in Syria after Assad flew to Russia and his government collapsed in the face of a lightning offensive by rebels that ended his family’s more than 50 years of iron-fisted rule.
He spoke to Reuters after he was interviewed at the site in al Qutayfah by Britain’s Channel 4 News for a report on the alleged mass grave there.
He said the intelligence branch of the Syrian air force was “in charge of bodies going from military hospitals, where bodies were collected after they’d been tortured to death, to different intelligence branches, and then they would be sent to a mass grave location.”
Corpses also were transported to sites by the Damascus municipal funeral office whose personnel helped unload them from refrigerated tractor-trailers, he said.
“We were able to talk to the people who worked on these mass graves that had on their own escaped Syria or that we helped to escape,” said Moustafa.
His group has spoken to bulldozer drivers compelled to dig graves and “many times on orders, squished the bodies down to fit them in and then cover them with dirt,” he said.
Moustafa expressed concern that graves sites were unsecured and said they needed to be preserved to safeguard evidence for investigations.

 


Syria’s Golani says rebel factions to be ‘disbanded’, calls for lifting sanctions

Syria’s Golani says rebel factions to be ‘disbanded’, calls for lifting sanctions
Updated 3 min 50 sec ago
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Syria’s Golani says rebel factions to be ‘disbanded’, calls for lifting sanctions

Syria’s Golani says rebel factions to be ‘disbanded’, calls for lifting sanctions
  • “Syria must remain united, and there must be a social contract between the state and all religions to guarantee social justice,” said Jolani

DAMASCUS: The leader of the Islamist group that toppled Bashar Assad said Monday that armed factions in war-torn Syria would be “disbanded” and their fighters placed under the defense ministry, and called for sanctions to be lifted so refugees can return.
Syrian president Assad was toppled by a lightning 11-day rebel offensive spearheaded by the Islamist Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham group (HTS), whose fighters and allies swept down from northwest Syria and entered the capital on December 8.
HTS leader Abu Mohammed Al-Golani said Monday on the group’s Telegram channel that all the rebel factions “would “be disbanded and the fighters trained to join the ranks of the defense ministry.”
“All will be subject to the law,” said Golani, who now uses his real name, Ahmed Al-Sharaa.
He also emphasized the need for unity in a country home to different ethnic minority groups and religions, while speaking to members of the Druze community — a branch of Shiite Islam making up about 3 percent of Syria’s pre-war population.
“Syria must remain united,” he said. “There must be a social contract between the state and all religions to guarantee social justice.”
Several countries and organizations have welcomed Assad’s fall but said they were waiting to see how the new authorities would treat minorities in the country.
During a second meeting with a delegation of British diplomats, the HTS leader also spoke “of the importance of restoring relations” with London.
He stressed the need to end “all sanctions imposed on Syria so that Syrian refugees can return to their country,” according to remarks reported on his group’s Telegram channel.
HTS is rooted in Syria’s branch of Al-Qaeda and proscribed as a terrorist organization by many Western governments, though it has sought to moderate its rhetoric.
Since the toppling of Assad, it has insisted that the rights of all Syrians will be protected.
 

 


UN chief welcomes aid commitments by new Syrian authorities

UN chief welcomes aid commitments by new Syrian authorities
Updated 17 December 2024
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UN chief welcomes aid commitments by new Syrian authorities

UN chief welcomes aid commitments by new Syrian authorities
  • Guterres called on the international community to rally behind the Syrian people as they “seize the opportunity to build a better future”

UNITED NATIONS: United Nations aid chief Tom Fletcher met with the commander of Syria’s new administration, Ahmed Al-Sharaa, and newly appointed Prime Minister Mohammed Al-Bashir on Monday to discuss scaling up humanitarian assistance in the country.
Following Fletcher’s meeting, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a statement that he welcomed the caretaker government’s commitment to protect civilians, including humanitarian workers.
“I also welcome their agreement to grant full humanitarian access through all border crossings; cut through bureaucracy over permits and visas for humanitarian workers; ensure the continuity of essential government services, including health and education; and engage in genuine and practical dialogue with the wider humanitarian community,” Guterres said.
Syria’s Bashar Assad was ousted after insurgent forces led by the Islamist Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham swept through Syria in a lightning offensive, ending more than 50 years of iron-fisted rule by his family.
Guterres called on the international community to rally behind the Syrian people as they “seize the opportunity to build a better future.” The United Nations says seven in 10 people in Syria continue to need humanitarian aid.
Fletcher also plans to visit Lebanon, Turkiye and Jordan, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said. (Reporting by Michelle Nichols Editing by Bill Berkrot)

 


US strikes Houthi command and control facility in Yemen

US strikes Houthi command and control facility in Yemen
Updated 17 December 2024
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US strikes Houthi command and control facility in Yemen

US strikes Houthi command and control facility in Yemen
  • The Yemeni rebels say their attacks — a significant international security challenge that threatens a major shipping lane — are in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza

WASHINGTON: American forces carried out an air strike on Monday against a Houthi command and control facility that was used by the Yemeni rebels to coordinate attacks, the US military said.
The Houthis began striking ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden in November 2023, part of the region-wide fallout from Israel’s devastating war in Gaza, which militant groups in multiple countries have cited as justification for attacks.
“The targeted facility was a hub for coordinating Houthi operations, such as attacks against US Navy warships and merchant vessels in the southern Red Sea and Gulf of Aden,” the US Central Command (CENTCOM) said in a statement.
“The strike reflects CENTCOM’s ongoing commitment to protect US and coalition personnel, regional partners, and international shipping,” it added.
The Yemeni rebels say their attacks — a significant international security challenge that threatens a major shipping lane — are in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.
Anger over Israel’s ongoing military campaign in the small coastal territory, which began after an unprecedented Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, has stoked violence involving Iran-backed groups in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen.
The United States and other countries have deployed military vessels to help shield shipping from the Houthi strikes, and the rebels have periodically launched attacks targeting American military ships.
Washington’s forces have also carried out frequent air strikes on the Houthis in a bid to degrade their ability to target shipping and have sought to seize weapons before they reach the rebels, but their attacks have persisted.
 

 


US-brokered ceasefire fails between Kurdish and Turkiye-backed forces in Syria

US-brokered ceasefire fails between Kurdish and Turkiye-backed forces in Syria
Updated 17 December 2024
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US-brokered ceasefire fails between Kurdish and Turkiye-backed forces in Syria

US-brokered ceasefire fails between Kurdish and Turkiye-backed forces in Syria
  • Shami blamed the collapse of the mediation on “Turkiye’s approach in dealing with the mediation efforts and its evasion to accept key points”

CAIRO: Syrian US-backed Kurdish Syrian forces (SDF) said U.S-brokered mediation efforts failed to reach a permanent ceasefire with Syria’s Turkiye-backed rebels in the northern cities of Manbij and Kobani, according to head of the SDF’s media center Farhad Shami on Monday.
Shami blamed the collapse of the mediation on “Turkiye’s approach in dealing with the mediation efforts and its evasion to accept key points.”
The Turks are not happy about the ceasefire deal and Turkiye prefers to keep maximum pressure on SDF, a Syrian opposition source told Reuters.
Last week, the SDF said they reached a ceasefire agreement with the Turkiye-backed rebels in Manbij through US mediation “to ensure the safety and security of civilians.”