Al -Jarrah Ghassan Abu Sitta said that Gaza’s medical staff systematically increased within an Israeli campaign aimed at destroying the health structure of the sector and forcing its residents to leave, stressing that the Palestinians will not leave their land, no matter how much the killing machine is.
Abu Sitt, a British Palestinian doctor, confirmed, in an exceptional episode of the “interview” program on Al -Jazeera, that he does not feel survival despite his life from the massacre of Al -Maedani Hospital, considering that whoever escapes death in such events remains a captive of her experience throughout his life, and he carries a sense of guilt and a moral duty to be a voice for those who died.
He added that the recent Israeli aggression on Gaza revealed a Zionist desire to change the societal structure of resistance societies, whether in Palestine or Lebanon, through a systematic targeting of families and killing them as a whole, stressing that what distinguishes this war is the shift from targeting individuals to eradicating full breeds.
The Palestinian doctor talked about his permanent struggle between the medical profession as a practice of life, and the reality of wars that involve doctors in the heart of death, recalling the moment he prepared to die inside the operating room in Al -Shifa Hospital during heavy shelling, when he sat in the corner to review the career of his life.
He explained that his political and professional awareness began since his childhood, specifically at the age of 13 when he witnessed the TV scenes of Beirut’s invasion in 1982 and targeting medical crews, which made him decide to become a doctor in the service of the project of his people, a decision that he adhered to since then.
Previous experiences
Abu Sitt stated that he participated in a volunteer in the West Bank and Gaza Strip during the first intifada, and later went to Iraq after the first Gulf War in a medical team to study the effects of the war, before working in southern Lebanon during the aggression of “clusters of anger”, then in Syria and Yemen later.
He pointed out that his transfer to the American University in Beirut in 2011 allowed him to establish an academic path in conflict medicine, as it combined field practice with scientific research, which helped him document the relationship between war and human health from a broader medical and societal perspective.
He revealed that the Gaza Strip was a field of experiments for the Israeli occupation weapons, explaining that the use of white phosphorus began to appear frequently since 2009, and that he personally saw the horrific injuries resulting from it, as the skin burns and phosphorus interacts with oxygen to return to ignition inside the body.
He explained that the medical teams in Gaza worked within the possibilities of scarce, praising the efforts of the Ministry of Health in Gaza, which were able to develop their medical cadres despite the siege, and succeeded in training ambulance teams to provide advanced first aid and stabilize injuries in semi -field conditions.
He stopped at the most difficult moments he lived during the aggression, when he was forced to perform surgeries for children without anesthesia due to the depletion of medicines, stressing that such experiments have a severe psychological effect on the child, and his pain threshold has changed permanently.
Loss of loved ones
He spoke with burning about the martyrdom of a number of his fellow doctors, including Dr. Medhat Saidam, Dr. Hammam Al -Louh and Dr. Adnan Al -Barash, who lost their lives either under the bombing or after the arrest, describing what happened as a deliberate targeting of medical cadres for the health sector.
He explained that more than 1,200 medical personnel were martyred, 33 out of 36 hospitals were destroyed, and only 4 operating rooms remain their full card, considering that rebuilding this sector will need at least 10 years financially, and a full human generation.
Abu Sitta did not hesitate to submit his testimony before the International Criminal Court, speaking about the bombing of Al -Ma’dani Hospital and the targeting of the wounded inside hospitals with drowned planes.
Abu Six criticized the silence of Western medical and human rights institutions, despite the movement of many individuals in Europe and America, noting that the liberal values that were founded on the European state after the Second World War are sacrificed today in defense of the Israeli genocide project.
He warned that the Gaza Strip is facing the risk of turning into an unpredictable area, as children with war are about 50 thousand, and each of them needs 8 to 12 surgeries, which means the need for hundreds of thousands of operations once the war ends.
Western collusion
He expressed his surprise at the complicity of the ruling elites in the West with these crimes, in exchange for great popular sympathy that appeared in universities and the western street, noting that more than 3,200 American students were arrested during the demonstrations of supporting Gaza, while Western regimes continue to suppress the solid voices.
He criticized the weak interaction in the Arab world, especially in universities and educational institutions, stressing that this war revealed the isolation of Arab societies from the Palestinian issue, and even its absence from history, according to his expression, compared to the advanced Western movement.
He talked about his election as President of the University of Glasgow, with an support rate exceeding 80% of students, considering that this represents an impressive symbolic message, especially since Balfour himself was a former president of the same university, and he is one of his victims dating back to the same position, in a deep historical significance.
When asked about the events of October 7, 2023, Abu Sitt saw that what happened was an attempt to cut off the way to liquidate the Palestinian issue, pointing out that the situation in Gaza before the operation was indicating an international acceptance of the continuation of the siege and the marginalization of the Nakba, which strengthened the feeling of movement.
He concluded by emphasizing that the Palestinian people will not leave, and that the refugee who has tasted the bitterness of the Nakba will not accept its reproduction, adding that those who live in Gaza prefer physical death over the social death associated with asylum, and that this rooted conviction will turn without passing any deportation projects.