Greater than 100 medical staff visited the Senate on Wednesday to demand lawmakers assist cease Israel’s army offensives towards Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Financial institution — campaigns that the Biden administration supported and the present Trump administration has continued to again.
The medical professionals are a part of Docs Towards Genocide, a grassroots coalition of well being care staff mobilizing towards acts of battle crimes and crimes towards humanity. The group has testified earlier than the United Nations and the U.S. authorities in hopes that political leaders can forestall and intervene acts of violence.
“We’re here to talk to our Congress about our support for what seems to be the worst attack on a civilian population in this century,” Dr. John Brewer, a retired emergency doctor, mentioned at DAG’s press convention on Wednesday.
“The attack[s] on women, pregnant women, children, targeting health care workers, doctors being shot, hospitals being destroyed, sewer treatment and water treatment plants destroyed — it’s just unparalleled to anything else at the current moment.”
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DAG shaped in 2023 in response to Israel’s army offensive in Gaza, which started after Hamas fighters killed about 1,200 folks in Israel and captured about 200. Nearly all of these hostages have since both been launched or are presumed useless, and the militant group is at the moment exchanging the remaining captives beneath a shaky ceasefire deal.
Israel’s army offensive has in the meantime flattened most of Gaza, displacing what the United Nations says is greater than 90% of Palestinians. As of Tuesday, the Gaza Health Ministry says Israeli forces have killed greater than 48,000 Palestinians over the past 15 months within the territory, with human rights teams and well being officers estimating the true quantity to be a lot increased.
A lot of the worldwide group — human rights organizations, assist staff, world leaders and the U.N. — have since described Israel’s U.S.-supported actions in Gaza as genocide, its rule within the occupied West Financial institution as apartheid and President Donald Trump’s proposal to forcibly expel Palestinians from Gaza as ethnic cleaning. Israeli officers have vehemently denied all of these accusations.
“I’ve been to Gaza as part of a humanitarian medical delegation. That was about five years ago, and I will say that at that time, Israel was doing the same thing it’s doing now. But it was a slow genocide,” Dr. David Sperber mentioned on the press convention. “Now it’s full out, the gloves are off and the mask is off.
“What I want to talk about is Israel’s targeting of the health care system,” he continued. “It’s guilty of genocide — the International Court of Justice has deemed so, and has called on it to stop all actions that are consistent with genocide.”
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Officers with the U.S. Capitol Police broke up DAG’s press convention within the Hart Senate Constructing, forcing the well being care staff to hold on exterior in smaller numbers. The coalition mentioned that regulation enforcement tried to arrest a number of the docs.
A USCP spokesperson advised HuffPost that officers threatened arrests as a result of members of the general public usually are not permitted to carry press conferences or demonstrations inside congressional buildings. As a result of DAG moved exterior, officers made no arrests.
“We want this message to go to the American people, that their elected officials’ buildings and halls do have space for people who vote to send more weapons, more arms, more tax dollars to mass murder children, to attack hospitals,” DAG co-founder Dr. Nidal Jboor mentioned. “But they don’t have space for the health care workers who demand the protection of children, the protection of the sanctity of life and the protection of hospitals.”
The docs are demanding senators help a proposed decision affirming that Palestinians have the suitable to self-determination — a rebuttal to Trump’s plan to forcibly displace tens of millions of Palestinians. The decision, which might be largely symbolic, would additionally “express the sense of the Senate” that the U.S. ought to not ship army belongings or personnel with a view to “take over” Gaza.
DAG additionally urged senators to help and co-sponsor a invoice by Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) that may restore U.S. funding to UNRWA, the U.N. company primarily answerable for offering and distributing life-saving humanitarian assist to Palestinian refugees. Congress halted funding for UNRWA final yr till March 2025, after Israeli officers accused the company of associating with Hamas. A number of investigations concluded that the accusation was unsubstantiated.
UNRWA faces collapse if the U.S. continues to withhold monetary help for the company. With out its assist, extra Palestinians will likely be left with out sufficient meals, well being care, training or correct sanitation, making them susceptible to different well being points.
Saul Loeb/AFP by way of Getty Photos
DAG additionally referred to as for senators to draft and help a decision to guard the well being care staff and medical establishments world wide — significantly in Gaza, the place virtually each hospital has confronted Israeli raids and bombing campaigns, and the place many medical professionals have confronted humiliation, detention and typically dying by Israeli forces.
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Among the many Palestinian docs detained is Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, director of the now-destroyed Kamal Adwan Hospital, whose frequent video diaries on social media helped the West see the disturbing actuality of Israel’s offensive in walled-off North Gaza. In response to Israeli media, Abu Safiya could also be launched on Saturday after months of residing in what he’s described as inhumane circumstances.
“These are our colleagues — they are being targeted, they are being tortured, they’re being abducted for the crime of caring for their patients,” mentioned Dr. Adlah Sukkar, including that Israel has killed greater than 200 members of her husband’s household, most of them kids.
“And so I don’t think it’s controversial for us to ask this of our elected officials. This is not complicated, this is easy,” she continued. “This is not a political issue, this is a health care issue. This shouldn’t be difficult.”
