Director detained

Dr Hussam Abu Safiya is a Palestinian paediatrician who served as director of Gaza’s Kamal Adwan Hospital from February 2024 until it was closed down and evacuated by Israel on Dec.27th. Upon leaving the hospital he told an Israeli tank commander that there was no one remaining in the hospital before he was detained and interrogated along with 240 staff members. Israel claimed the hospital was a Hamas stronghold. Before this Israeli operation he had told multiple media outlets that Israeli sniper fire and tank shells had damaged key hospital departments and equipment,

On Jan.2, 2025,Physicians for Human Rights-Israel submitted a request on behalf of Abu Safiya’s family asking for information on his whereabouts. After saying it had “no indication” that Abu Safiya was being held, the Israeli army admitted he was under investigation for being a Hamas officer although detainees arrested with him denied this accusation. He was taken to a prison in the Negev where he suffered beatings and his health deteriorated. During early court appearances he was denied a lawyer. He first met his lawyer at Ofer prison in the West Bank where Abu Safiya described mistreatment and being in solitary confinement for 25 days. He received no medical treatment for a heart condition.

After visiting him at Ofer again in March, his lawyer said, “He is suffering from arterial tension, cardiac arrhythmia and vision problems,” and that “he has lost 20 kilos in two months and fractured four ribs during interrogations, without receiving proper medical care.” She claimed Abu Safiya is being tortured to get him to confess to operating on injured Hamas members, which he denies.

The World Health Organisation (WHO), Amnesty International, the Council on American Islamic Relations, Human Rights Watch, Med Global and the American Academy of Pediatrics have called for his immediate release. Instead, on October 16th his detention was renewed for six months.

Amnesty stated, “Dr. Abu Safiya’s arrest and ongoing arbitrary detention without charges or trial – based on the abusive Unlawful Combatants’ Law – is a reflection of Israel’s systematic targeting of Palestinian health workers and the decimation of the healthcare system in Gaza in order to inflict conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians.” According to the term’s definition, this amounts to genocide.

Abu Safiya personifies the Palestinian story since the creation of Israel in 1948. He was born in 1973 into a prominent family residing in the Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza after being driven from their hometown Hamama, near Ashkelon. After completing his secondary education, Abu Safiya took the professional education route adopted by millions of Palestinians by studying medicine at a university in Kazakhstan. He returned to Gaza in 1996 where he took up the position as head of the paediatric unit in the hospital and in 2004 became its director.

Following the launch of Israel’s war on Gaza, he moved his family into the hospital although it was besieged by the Israeli army on several occasions amid accusations that Kamal Adan was sheltering armed Hamas fighters and treating their wounded. On Oct.25, 2024, Abu Safiya was briefly detained, and his 15-year-old son Ibrahim was killed in a drone strike on the entrance to the hospital. A month later, Abu Safiya was injured in his leg by shrapnel from a drone strike on the hospital while he was returning to his office after surgery. He stated, “This will not stop us. I was injured at my workplace, and that is an honour. My blood is no more precious than that of my colleagues or the people we serve. I will return to my patients as soon as I recover.”

Between November 2024 and his arrest in December, Abu Safiya documented daily life at the hospital on Instagram. On Dec.23, he told NBC News, “Bullets had penetrated the intensive care unit, the maternity department and the specialized surgery department, all types of weapons, including sniper fire, tank shells and quadcopters have been used to target the hospital’s nursery, maternity ward and various other departments.” His detailed descriptions exposed Israel’s repeated violations of the laws of war that prohibit attacks on hospitals and medical facilities if they are not involved in military activity. He called upon the international community to halt Israel’s systematic destruction of Gaza’s vital health care facilities.

Last week, WHO warned that infectious diseases are “spiralling out of control” as only 13 of Gaza’s 36 hospitals are partially functioning. Regional health director Hanan Balkhy told AFP that there were rising cases of meningitis, diarrhoea, and respiratory illnesses which need to be addressed urgently. She warned the challenges are “unimaginable. We need more fuel to go into Gaza, we need more food, more medical equipment, medications, medics, doctors.” Under Donald Trump’s ceasefire deal, Israel freed dozens of doctors, nurses, and medical technicians but 100 remain in prison, including high profile Abu Safiya.

Photo: TNS