In their own words: Gaza doctor
Haytham Kallab is a general practitioner at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis. He told Al Jazeera he’s witnessed horrific injuries that are hard to comprehend:
“The war on Gaza is completely different than any previous wars, because of the huge numbers of casualties we receive in Nasser hospital.
“The nature of the cases that arrive at the hospital is terrifying. The type of burns that we receive are not like previous wars and neither is the number of casualties. The majority of the cases that I receive are children and women. Most of the people who come for treatment are civilians.
“Hitting and targeting hospitals is not ethical at all. Imagine the pressure we’re under because we might be attacked at any moment while doing our jobs – especially a humanitarian job.
“An ambulance was hit inside Nasser hospital while I was working. It was a horrifying scene, especially seeing my colleagues who were helping and moving patients, then becoming injured themselves. People who work in emergency departments – especially during wars and specifically in Gaza – see things that no human could ever comprehend.
“Maybe the hardest case me for was a mother holding her child. The child was dead. She was holding her baby while her legs were broken. She had multiple injuries and had to be resuscitated. I didn’t know whether to take her child away from her. I decided to allow her to keep holding her son. This affected me so I followed up. Then I heard her say she wished she had died rather than had her legs amputated.”
This is an interview with a doctor who works in Khan Younis, it's a hard read. I was struck by how different he says the type of injuries are in this conflict and reminded of a book called The Palestinian Laboratory, I haven't read it but I saw a discussion about it somewhere on line. I found this video explaining the same thing. The channel is Turkish, the author of the book I mentioned, Anthony Loewenstein is Australian and Jewish.