Medan, Indonesia – Presently of the 12 months, it must be strawberry season within the Gaza Strip.
As an alternative, the fields historically planted with strawberries in September and harvested from November are actually battlefields.
One of the vital fertile areas for Palestine’s famend strawberries is Beit Lahia, with its good local weather, wealthy soil and high-quality water provides.
Situated in north Gaza, Beit Lahia can also be the house of the Indonesian Hospital the place medical volunteer from Indonesia Fikri Rofiul Haq is predicated with the Indonesian humanitarian organisation the Medical Emergency Rescue Committee (MER-C).
“The Israeli forces have been bombing fields throughout the Gaza Strip and a number of crops have died”, Haq advised Al Jazeera.
“This 12 months, there gained’t be the standard produce like strawberries, despite the fact that it’s the winter season,” he stated.
Amid the horror of Israel’s warfare on Gaza, the destruction of Palestine’s strawberry harvest could seem insignificant.
However for Haq – certainly one of three Indonesian MER-C volunteers based mostly on the Indonesian Hospital – the reminiscence of Gaza’s strawberries helps him cope. Every day is now a matter of survival within the territory, the place Israel is now concentrating its assaults on hospitals.
“Originally of the warfare, we have been nonetheless capable of get some items from the world across the hospital, like greens and instantaneous noodles, however now it’s not possible to get recent produce like onions, tomatoes and cucumbers,” he stated, chatting with Al Jazeera via WhatsApp voice messages.
“On the Indonesia Hospital now, employees solely get a meal as soon as a day at lunchtime, which is offered by [the neighbouring] Al-Shifa Hospital. For breakfast and dinner, employees eat biscuits or dates,” he stated.
Situations at each the Indonesian and Al-Shifa hospitals, in addition to different hospitals in Gaza, have severely deteriorated since Al Jazeera final spoke to Haq on Friday.
Dr Mohammad Abu Salmiya, the director of Al-Shifa Hospital, warned on Saturday that a whole lot of injured individuals in addition to new child infants wanted to be urgently transported to an operational medical facility as his hospital was crumbling underneath the pressure of an absence of gasoline and medication – in addition to Israeli bombardments.
“It’s a tragedy. The lifeless our bodies – we are able to’t put them in freezers as they’re not functioning so we determined to dig a pit within the neighborhood of the hospital. It’s a really inhumane scene. The state of affairs is completely uncontrolled. Tons of of our bodies are decomposing,” Abu Salmiya advised Al Jazeera.
Atef al-Kahlot, the director of the Indonesian Hospital, stated his facility is working solely at between 30-40 p.c of capability and he made an attraction for the world to assist.
“We name on the honourable individuals of the world, if any of them are left, to place strain on the occupation forces to provide the Indonesian Hospital and the remainder of the hospitals within the Gaza Strip,” he stated.
Earlier than the warfare
Earlier than the warfare, meals provides for the Indonesian Hospital have been often sourced from close by areas, Haq stated. At first of Israel’s complete blockade and assaults on Gaza, MER-C volunteers would exit to hunt for provides in ambulances, offered by the hospital, which have been thought of safer than civilian automobiles.
Now the preventing has come so near the hospital that it’s too harmful to enterprise outdoors.
Haq advised Al Jazeera that he has been feeling significantly shaken currently, following an tour about two weeks in the past to supply medical provides for the hospital from civilian houses within the surrounding Al-Jalaa district, throughout which he thought he would possibly die.
He and different volunteers from Indonesia have been solely about 20 minutes from the hospital when bombs began to fall some 200 metres (218 yards) away.
“I felt probably the most scared and resigned to my destiny then, as a result of we have been in buildings owned by locals and, as we all know, the Israeli army is destroying civilian houses,” he stated.
“There was no assure of our security. It made me really feel extraordinary worry however, by the grace of God, we have been protected.”
Because of the journey, Haq was capable of finding some medical provides for the hospital and hand out meals packets to medical employees.
However since that near-miss with Israeli shells and missiles, he and the opposite volunteers have stayed inside the hospital grounds the place they sleep within the docs’ quarters.
“The trauma we skilled was so nice however, if we keep on the hospital grounds, I really feel secure as a result of the Israeli army has indirectly attacked the hospital but,” he stated.
“The realm across the hospital is being bombarded continually and when that occurs, I really feel a really human worry,” he added.
Previously week, areas across the Indonesian and different hospitals within the Gaza Strip have been the targets of intensifying Israeli bombardments.
Israeli tanks have closed in, encircling the medical amenities the place tens of 1000’s of displaced Palestinians have sought shelter as Israel’s bombardment flattens whole neighbourhoods in Gaza. Greater than 11,000 individuals have now been killed within the territory.
Haq recounts the Israeli bombing being so shut that it made the hospital constructing shake and a part of the roof had already collapsed.
“Often, when there are bombings, the hospital constructing sways however on November 9, it felt as if the hospital was being lifted up off its foundations,” he stated.
“It simply made us terrified.”
Treating wounds and documenting tragedy
Haq advised Al Jazeera that when the bombing begins, he and the opposite employees take refuge within the basement of the hospital. Their day by day work schedule fluctuates in accordance with the numerous wants of employees and sufferers.
“Some days I work from 11am till 4pm the following day and simply sleep a number of hours the place I can. The opposite day, I slept from 7am to 8am after which began once more,” he stated.
In 2011, MER-C organised donations to construct the Indonesian Hospital, which was formally inaugurated in 2016 by Indonesia’s then-Vice President Jusuf Kalla.
MER-C employees are technically medical humanitarian volunteers. Now, certainly one of their major roles is to doc the sick and injured who come to the hospital and monitor the assaults across the facility.
Haq and his colleagues additionally help with medical therapy, significantly because the state of affairs continues to deteriorate and docs on the hospital are overrun with sufferers streaming in from surrounding areas.
“On Wednesday final week, when sufferers rushed to the hospital, we helped deal with minor wounds as a result of there weren’t sufficient docs to deal with all of the sufferers,” he stated.
Whereas Indonesia has been working to evacuate a few of its nationals in Gaza, Haq advised Al Jazeera that he wouldn’t be certainly one of them.
“God keen, me and the 2 different MER-C volunteers have determined to remain within the Gaza Strip,” he stated.
“We actually admire the Indonesian Ministry of Overseas Affairs serving to to evacuate Indonesian residents from Gaza, however that’s our resolution,” he stated about selecting to stay in Gaza.
“We hope we are able to preserve serving to residents of Gaza to seek out gasoline, meals and medical provides, and deal with them on the Indonesia Hospital. That’s our motivation to maintain going.”
Al Jazeera has been unable to contact Haq since midnight on Friday.
