Israeli offensive in Rafah would lead to ‘massacres’, doctors warn UN — RT World News

The humanitarian crisis in Gaza will transform “Infinitely worse” Western doctors warned that if Israel launches its planned ground attack against Hamas fighters holed up in the southern end of the Palestinian Strip.

More than a million civilians, many of them starving, have taken refuge in the area after previous Israeli attacks leveled their neighborhoods.

“This is perhaps the worst crisis that could happen in this war.” Dr. Zaher Sahloul, co-founder of US-based medical charity MedGlobal, He told reporters On Tuesday at the United Nations headquarters in New York. “If there is any attack, they will commit a bloodbath, one massacre after another.”

He added that his colleagues who are still working in Gaza warned that the Israeli attack on Rafah could lead to the death of 250,000 people.

Sahloul was among a group of Western doctors who traveled to Washington this week for meetings with US lawmakers and government officials to draw more attention to the desperate humanitarian conditions caused by the war between Israel and Hamas.

The doctors made their appeals for a ceasefire – and to cancel the planned attack on Rafah – after carrying out volunteer work in the Gaza Strip earlier this year.

“I saw the most horrific atrocities, and I saw things I never expected to see in any health care setting.” said Dr. Nick Maynard, a British surgeon who has worked in the Palestinian territories for more than a decade. “I saw things in Al-Aqsa [Martyrs] The hospital I still wake up at night thinking about – the horrific injuries, especially to women and children.

Maynard gave the example of a young girl who was burned so badly that he could see the bones in her face. “We knew there was no chance of surviving this.” He said. “But there was no morphine to give her, so not only would she inevitably die, she would die in agony.” The girl was left on the emergency room floor to die.

Dr. Amber Alyan, a pediatrician from Texas who volunteers through Doctors Without Borders, said the lack of supplies has forced doctors in Gaza to make horrific choices, such as having to perform amputations without anesthesia. There are no beds available for many patients after surgery, and the condition of wounded Gazans is deteriorating due to the infection of their wounds.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected international pressure to cancel the Rafah operation, and insisted on the need to move forward to prevent Hamas from posing a new threat to West Jerusalem. The latest war broke out when Hamas fighters raided villages in southern Israel on October 7, killing more than 1,100 people and taking hundreds of hostages to Gaza.

The Israeli response has killed more than 31,000 Gazans, according to local health authorities, and displaced an estimated 85% of the besieged enclave's population. The Israeli army claimed that civilians would be transferred to the area “Human Islands” North of Rafah before the start of the ground attack.

“There is no safe place for them to go.” said Maynard, who said Israeli forces were aiming for that “judiciary” Palestinians from Gaza. “What is happening in Gaza meets every definition of genocide I have read.” The surgeon added, “If there was an invasion, a ground invasion of Rafah, it would be horrific, really, the number of deaths we would see.”