Khan Younis, Gaza Strip – Ahmed Isleem needs he have been lifeless.
The 35-year-old’s spouse and daughter have been killed together with 10 different members of the family and neighbours in an Israeli assault on their dwelling. He lies on a mattress within the European Gaza Hospital within the southern metropolis of Khan Younis, surrounded by sounds of different sufferers moaning and crying out in ache.
Isleem was pulled out from below the rubble of his dwelling final month.
“I can’t imagine that I’m nonetheless alive,” he says. “Getting out from below the rubble was very troublesome. I needed I had been martyred with my household as an alternative of the struggling and ache I’m experiencing now.”
Isleem suffered a number of shrapnel accidents on totally different components of his physique together with his stomach, and underwent surgical procedure on his digestive system and one other operation to insert platinum in his foot after it was damaged.
“There isn’t a security, no therapy, nothing,” he says. “I can’t bear my ache and the screams of the opposite injured individuals round me as properly.”
As a result of lack of gas and medical provides and the Israeli focusing on of hospitals, the healthcare system within the Gaza Strip has all however collapsed. And as hospitals in northern Gaza and Gaza Metropolis have been rendered out of service, the burden on the few purposeful hospitals within the central and southern components of the enclave has elevated.
The European Gaza Hospital receives dozens of Palestinians killed and wounded every day, a few of them referrals from different overwhelmed hospitals. Additionally it is a spot of shelter for displaced individuals, regardless of the dearth of provisions.
Khawla Abu Daqqa, 40, is from the jap Khan Younis space, close to the Israeli fence which has been focused incessantly by bombings and artillery shelling. She fled together with her 5 kids to the hospital, saying she had no alternative.
“The place can we go? We have now no shelter,” she says. “All the things is troublesome right here, from discovering meals, water and even sleep. I want I may sleep at the very least 5 hours a day. I can’t sleep or relaxation. I hope this warfare will cease for everybody.”
‘Excessive fatigue’
In a dialog with Al Jazeera, the director of the European Gaza Hospital, Dr Youssef al-Aqqad, says that displaced individuals – who come from everywhere in the Gaza Strip – are having to search out house wherever they will within the hospital: on the doorways of affected person rooms, within the corridors, on the steps, and within the hospital backyard.
“These displaced individuals want companies, together with meals, water and electrical energy,” he says. “We additionally really feel very involved concerning the Israeli military focusing on hospitals. That is an irregular and terrifying factor for sufferers and displaced individuals as properly.”
Al-Aqqad says dozens of wounded individuals arrive every day from the cities of Rafah and Khan Younis.
Because of this, the variety of infections is on the rise and has exceeded the capability that the hospital can deal with. Al-Aqqad says a area hospital has been arrange within the Ras Naqoura Faculty, which is adjoining to the hospital’s jap wing and the place sufferers with average or minor infections are handled.
“This isn’t a simple matter, however fairly very difficult as a result of the colleges will not be geared up and appropriate to obtain contaminated individuals and there’s no medical gear and units there,” he says. “Moreover, our medical workers is already stretched skinny and should observe up right here and there, which had led to excessive fatigue.”
The hospital has 450 wounded sufferers. A few of them, he says, require a number of specialist medical doctors — akin to a neurosurgeon, a vascular physician, an orthopaedic physician for damaged bones, and one other professional for burns.
The medical workers are exhausted from the continuous work, and the volunteers who help them have little to no expertise.
“We want specialised medical doctors to work in intensive care rooms, operations and delicate surgical specialities,” al-Aqqad says. “We have now reached a troublesome stage in well being companies, and we really feel that we’re giving past our power and skill to avoid wasting the injured and attempt to deal with them.”
‘Experiencing the worst of all of it’
At the least 26 out of the 35 hospitals within the Gaza Strip will not be functioning because of the lack of gas and assaults by the Israeli military.
Within the northern Gaza Strip, the Indonesian Hospital has been bombed repeatedly by the Israeli military, which additionally ordered the evacuation of medical doctors and the wounded. This compelled the Ministry of Well being in Gaza to distribute the injured to hospitals within the central and southern Gaza Strip, together with the European Gaza Hospital.
Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital can be below nice stress, after exceeding its capability to obtain individuals wounded within the Israeli assaults on cities and refugee camps within the central Gaza Strip, together with Deir el-Balah, Nuseirat and Bureij.
Al-Aqqad urges worldwide well being and human rights organisations to intervene to cease “this hideous warfare” on Gaza.
“I’ve by no means seen in my life hospitals which might be besieged and bombed out of service and compelled to discharge sufferers to go away their hospital beds earlier than finishing their restoration course of,” he says. “What we’re experiencing is the worst of all. Save what stays of the individuals of Gaza.”