Many of Gaza’s Medical Workers Have Been Detained or Killed
Dr. Khaled El Serr last spoke to his family in mid-March, a week before Israeli troops raided the hospital in southern Gaza where he worked as a surgeon.
“No one has seen or heard of him ever again,” said his cousin, Osaid AlSerr, a surgical resident in the United States. “We do not even know whether he is dead or alive.”
Dr. El Serr was arrested by the Israeli military, according to Amnesty International, citing the accounts of co-workers and Palestinian detainees who have been released. But the military has refused to say whether it is holding him.
His story is not unique. More than 300 of Gaza’s health workers are in Israeli detention, the enclave’s health ministry says, while others have been detained for a time and then released. And according to the World Health Organization, 500 have been killed in the war, out of a prewar total of about 20,000.
Based on estimates of the war’s toll, that means medical workers have been killed and detained at higher rates than Gazans generally, a severe blow to a health care system whose facilities have been devastated by war, and a population weakened by hunger, lack of clean water and the rampant spread of diseases.
“That equates to an average of two health care workers killed every day, with one in every 40 health care workers, or 2.5 percent of Gaza’s health care work force, now dead,” Medical Aid for Palestinians, a British charity, said in a statement.
Asked about the detentions, the Israeli military said in a written response that “it does not deliberately detain doctors” but that “suspects of terrorist activities are detained” and taken for detention and questioning in Israel. Those found not to have been involved in “terrorist activity” are released back to the Gaza Strip, the military said.
An undated photo of Dr. Khaled El Serr in Gaza.Credit…via Dr. Khaled El Serr
Some of the doctors who have been released have said they were tortured in Israeli jails, which the Israeli military has denied. Others have died in custody, according to rights groups.
The director of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, Dr. Mohammad Abu Salmiya, was taken into custody seven months ago, after Israeli forces first raided the hospital — the largest in Gaza — saying that Hamas fighters were using it for military purposes and had tunnels underneath it. No charges were brought against him.
Released on July 1, Dr. Abu Salmiya said at a news conference that he and others had been subjected to “extreme torture.” His finger had been broken, he said, and he had been beaten over the head repeatedly. His release set off a round of finger-pointing among Israeli authorities over who had authorized his detention, but there was no additional clarity on the cause or conditions of his time being held.
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