Gaza: Eyewitness Accounts to Crimes Against Humanity
This was a very hard piece to write, but I felt an urgency to document and share the information with you. There is no sugarcoating what we are witnessing.
"Overcrowding exacerbated the spread of disease, and the lack of medical supplies meant that diseases quickly became epidemics. Residents were provided starvation rations only. Many people sold whatever possessions they were able to take with them on the black market to pay for extra food… ‘Is it conceivable that they would kill a whole nation?' they would ask themselves, and this would reassure them."
This quote does not come from Gaza. It is a description of the treatment of the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto that I took from the National World War II Museum. I chose it because we are in such uncharted territory there needed to be some kind of comparison to help us grasp the horror and unprecedented evil that we are witnessing in Gaza.
Witness is an important word.
When the Warsaw ghetto was destroyed in March 1943, the world didn't know the details. But with Gaza, we see what is happening before our very eyes.
The Israeli government has made no secret about their plans. Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich has boasted that "Gaza will be entirely destroyed."
Independent experts at the United Nations have called the situation a "slaughter of the innocents." They warn that unless the world acts, we will witness the "annihilation of the Palestinian people."
Medical professionals report that children are so malnourished they are going blind.
So far, the response from the West has been pitiful.
Germany, the UK, France, and Canada have said very little about the mass starvation and terror bombing of the Palestinian people. Meanwhile, Donald Trump posted a grotesque AI parody of him and Benjamin Netanyahu having drinks over the destroyed and rebuilt waste that is Gaza.
Emboldened, Israel is now openly declaring their intention to destroy the people of Gaza.
This is not just Israel's genocide. This is ours as well.
I want to share information presented by front-line medical workers who recently held a Doctors Against Genocide forum updating the West on the conditions facing people in Gaza.
This testimony is vitally important, although you are unlikely to hear their voices in the mainstream media.
I am so honoured that Martha Miller, a resistance activist and nurse in Boston, kept such excellent notes that we can share.
Doctors Against Genocide, Virtual Forum - Sunday, May 4, 2025
Dr. Mohamad Abu Selmia — Director of Al Shifa Hospital
The Situation in Gaza is very difficult. The IDF (Israeli Defense Force) is preventing fuel coming in. There is only fuel for three days. Once it is finished, the hospitals will completely shut down.
Israel is intent on destroying the healthcare system.
Doctors have witnessed hundreds of killings in the hospitals: pediatric, psychiatric, etc. It is a premeditated act to destroy the hospitals, so people are forced to leave. Hospitals that should be protected by international law are being targeted.
Nearly 1400 people in the healthcare system have been killed by IDF.
There are 400 healthcare workers incarcerated in the Israeli prison system. For the last 62 days, nothing has been allowed into Gaza.
There is a lack of all supplies, x-rays, meds, fluids, etc.
When mass casualties come to hospitals, people die who should have been saved because of the lack of medical supplies. People are in severe pain, which is very distressing. They are dealing with women and children suffering 90% burns.
There were over 2000 beds; now there are only 300.
Infection control is a disaster. 40% of patients with renal failure have died because of a lack of renal dialysis. People need dialysis, and it is not available, so they die.
Before the war, there were 100 incubators; now, there are less than 20, so survival for newborns is extremely low. Cancer patients: there is no radio or chemotherapy. All they can do is wait for death, as there is no chance of evacuation to a hospital.
Starvation and Malnutrition are affecting children to a great degree. Sixty-five children died from starvation, as recorded by the Ministry of Health. Tens of thousands of children are now suffering from malnutrition and can die at any moment.
Pregnant women are so malnourished that children are born with severe birth defects. These are defects doctors have never seen before, likely due to the new weapons that are being used in Gaza.
All medical missions, including the World Health Organization, are forbidden to enter Gaza. 14,000 patients are waiting to be evacuated and not allowed, basically waiting for a death sentence.
The healthcare system is in complete failure. All NGO organizations admit that Israel is not allowing any aid into Gaza, but no serious action has been taken to correct this.
The Health Ministry says there are 52,000 deaths with 55% women and children.
There are thousands killed in their homes or under the rubble. Those numbers haven't been recorded.
Dr. Youssef Abu Al-Rish — Health Ministry of Gaza
The situation is getting worse and worse, beyond any words.
Last update on meds and consumables:
43% of meds at zero stock
53% of meds to maternal health at zero stock
64% of consumables at zero stock
87% of consumables related to trauma and ortho at zero stock
84% zero stock for ophthalmologic trauma
There is no fuel to transport healthcare workers to the different hospitals. If they go on foot, it can take several hours. The UN agencies have told them Israel is going to evacuate the area in the North.
Where to?
The Al Rahma Primary Care Centre has been destroyed. It was the major primary care center in Gaza.
Food is not reaching people. They are fighting for very small amounts of food, creating a catastrophic situation. The sewage system is a disaster. Routine vaccinations, such as the polio vaccine, collapsed.
Many of the dead children are not being registered. The numbers are calculated by counting dead bodies they can identify by ID number, DOB, full name. If they are missing any info, they are not included in the registry.
Many are under the rubble.
Thus, lots of unknown cases are not being registered.
Israel is not allowing in oxygen. Some of patients are oxygen dependent. ICUs are in need of oxygen and unable to get it. The IDF is not allowing in rehab materials into Gaza. They are unable to renovate any parts of the hospital after the attacks.
The IDF is still attacking healthcare workers. 14,000 patients are in dire need to be evacuated.
Communicable disease disaster.
No safe shelter.
No food
No medicine.
Very difficult to reach the hospital. Immunity is poor and people are developing diseases as a result. More will be lost as the cases of malnutrition mount.
Every 40 minutes, there is a child killed in Gaza.
Dr. Marwan Al Hams — Director of Field Hospitals in Gaza
Before the war, there were 38 functioning hospitals in Gaza with all kinds of specialties, surgeries, etc., like CABG and organ transplants, even with the siege manageable.
Now the situation is MUCH WORSE because of deliberate medicide by Israel.
Medical staff are trying to continue to support their patients even amidst this catastrophe. Many have lost ⅔ to ¾ of their own families. They are exhausted, starving without a break, but they continue to work.
There is a lack of units of blood, while the need and demand for transfusions are extreme. When they ask people to come to donate blood, hundreds show up, but most are unable to because they are anemic and malnourished.
People suffer from impetigo, chicken pox, and scabies, and no treatment is available. These conditions are spreading like fire - no sanitation, no clean water.
99% of service for cardiac patients has been lost.
Worst of all, healthcare workers are being targeted. Many have been murdered, abducted, tortured.
There have been 388 healthcare workers abducted, imprisoned, and tortured.
Hamza Nabhan — Northern Gaza, Indonesian Hospital, 3rd-year medical student from Al Azhar
Since the beginning of the war, he has been volunteering in hospitals in Northern Gaza. The situation is beyond what anyone can handle. The targeting of healthcare workers is intentional.
There is no CT scan at Indonesian Hospital because it was destroyed by IDF.
There are no MRI machines in Gaza.
International mass casualty incidents.
50-60% triaged to green zone where most critical treated, but in Gaza 50-60% patients going to red zone where most critical treated.
The IDF destroyed their solar system during the last siege. They rely solely on generators but need fuel and are running out of power, ventilating units, etc.
Lack of meds, pain killers, antibiotics etc. Overcrowded shelters and infrastructure, seeing an increase in infectious disease and skin disease
Increased sewage near the hospital.
There is no food for medical staff in the hospital, yet they continue to work to try to save as many lives as possible, and no proper rest, it is unimaginable and the constant fear that they will be invaded at any moment.
Fear the hospital may be bombed as the other hospitals bombed and they have been bombed. More than 70% of the casualties at his hospital are women and children.
Their suffering is heartbreaking.
"We are just asking for safety, to stop the genocide and preserve what is left of us."
My friends, I am overwhelmed just trying to put these notes into a form to be shared.
We need to speak up while we still can. We need to push for action for governments to implement a full boycott and sanctions on Israel.
Any citizen from Canada or another western nation serving in the IDF must be investigated for participation in war crimes. We must support the work of the International Court of Justice in holding those responsible to account.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
Support the work of Doctors Against Genocide
CANADIAN ACTION
Contact our UN Ambassador, Bob Rae, and demand that he speak up. Canada helped establish the International Criminal Court; we cannot be complicit in these crimes against humanity.
Phone: 212-848-1100 // Email: canada.un@international.gc.ca
INTERNATIONAL ACTION
For US and overseas supporters, please contact your elected representatives.
Finally... a post on Canada's inaction regarding the genocide we are witnessing in Gaza. Just wrote to Bob Rae. I will be sending an email to my MLA. Charlie, thank you for this very important piece!
Thank you for documenting these horrific atrocities. I recently picked up Dangerous Memories and as someone who studied museum curation briefly in university, I resonated a lot with your notion of the moral obligation of remembering. We cannot leave it to the historians. Collective memory is truth making.