In Dense Gaza, Civilians Suffer
- From: Basil H <hamdan.basil@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 22:36:32 -0800 (PST)
January 1, 2009
In Dense Gaza, Civilians Suffer
By TAGHREED EL-KHODARY
GAZA — A dentist stood at the bed of a doctor, his good friend Ehab
Madhoun, 32, who had just died, his shrapnel-pitted body wrapped in a
white shroud.
The day before, Dr. Madhoun, a general practitioner, was in an
ambulance responding to an Israeli strike at the Jabalya refugee camp
in northern Gaza. Another missile hit the ambulance. The driver,
Muhammad Abu Hasira, died instantly. Dr. Madhoun lingered for a day,
dying of his wounds on Wednesday in the intensive care unit of Shifa
Hospital, where hundreds of people have been brought since Israel
began its heaviest assault on Gaza in three decades.
The dentist cried.
“He was just doing his work,” said the dentist, who would not give his
name. “He’s a doctor, and I can’t understand why Israel would hit an
ambulance. They can tell from the cameras it’s an ambulance.”
It has always been this way, over years of conflict here, that
civilians are killed in the densely populated Gaza Strip when Israel
stages military operations it says are essential for its security. But
five days of Israeli airstrikes have surpassed past operations in
scale and intensity; the long-distance bombardment of the Hamas-
controlled territory has, however well aimed at those suspected of
being militants, splintered families and shattered homes in one of the
most densely populated places on Earth.
Among the total dead — between 320 and 390, according to the United
Nations — Palestinian medical officials say that 38 were children and
25 were women. The United Nations agency that helps Palestinian
refugees said 25 percent of those killed had been civilians. Israel
said it knew of 40 civilian deaths but that it was still checking.
Israeli officials are coming under increasing pressure to ease
conditions for civilians, with tight supplies of electricity, water,
food and medicine worsening shortages in an area already largely
sealed off from the outside world. While Israel on Wednesday refused a
48-hour cease-fire suggested by the French to allow critical supplies
into Gaza, it has been sensitive enough to the ever-louder complaints
to say it will do all it can to allow in supplies.
On the issue of civilian casualties, Israeli officials maintain that
they do not take aim at civilians and do everything possible — like
using precision-guidance systems, up-to-the minute intelligence,
leaflets and phone calls to targeted areas — to avoid hitting them.
They say killing and wounding civilians only undermines their primary
mission: to stop Hamas from firing rockets into civilian areas of
Israel.
“I haven’t seen too many tears shed in Paris, London or Berlin over
the fact that we have hit Hamas targets,” said Mark Regev, a spokesman
for Israel’s prime minister, Ehud Olmert. “So we have many reasons,
both moral and political, for doing the utmost to make sure that our
strikes are as surgical as possible.”
Further complicating matters is that fact that Gaza is the size of
Detroit, with one and a half times as many people. The military and
government facilities of Hamas are intertwined with buildings where
Gaza’s civilian population lives and works. Israelis say Hamas fires
rockets at Israel from civilian neighborhoods.
The United States military has also faced much criticism for killing
civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan, despite what officials say is the
utmost precaution against doing so.
In Gaza, human rights groups say that the new scale of Israel’s
operation puts the area’s civilians, even those accustomed to
conflict, under particular stress. Some of the wounded are afraid to
seek treatment at the already overwhelmed hospitals, fearful of
heading into a rocket attack while driving through streets of pummeled
buildings and concrete shards.
Large, multigenerational families huddle in their houses, hoarding the
shrinking supplies of water, food and gasoline. Despite the cold, many
have kept their windows open to prevent them from shattering when
bombs explode nearby. Shops are closed except for grocery stores,
bakeries and pharmacies.
“Conditions for parents and children in Gaza are dangerous and
frightening,” Maxwell Gaylard, United Nations humanitarian coordinator
for the Palestinian territories, said in a statement.
“It is absolutely crucial that there is an end to the fighting,” he
said. “Without it, more civilians will continue to be killed. Without
the violence stopping, it is extremely difficult to get food to people
who need it, we cannot assess where the most urgent needs are.”
In the debate over civilian casualties, there is no clear
understanding of what constitutes a military target. Palestinians
argue that because Hamas is also the government in Gaza, many of the
police officers who have been killed were civil servants, not hard-
core militants. Israel disagrees, asserting also that a university
chemistry laboratory, which it claims was used for making rockets, was
a fair target in an attack this week, even if it could not show
conclusively that those inside the laboratory at the time where
engaged in making weapons.
The ambiguity was evident at the intensive care ward in Shifa
Hospital, where Dr. Madhoun’s body lay. There were 11 patients. One
was a pharmacist, Rawya Awad, 32, who had a shrapnel wound to the
head. Several were police officers. It was impossible to know the
identities of many of the others.
But there were several children in another intensive care unit on
Tuesday. Among them was Ismael Hamdan, 8, who had severe brain damage
as well as two broken legs, according to a doctor there. Earlier that
day, two of his sisters, Lama, 5, and Hayya, 12, were killed.
“I prepared them breakfast that day in the garden,” said their mother,
Ayda, 36. “They had the tea, bread and thyme. Lama wanted a second
pita, but we all teased her saying, ‘Keep it for lunch.’ She told us,
‘Don’t worry, God will provide us with bread.’
“She made all of us laugh,” the mother said. “I cleaned after them and
collected the garbage. Ismael volunteered to dump the garbage, but
Hayya and Lama joined him. The garbage can is in front of the house, a
five-minute walk away. All of a sudden I heard the news from a
neighbor, and I ran barefoot to the hospital. A relative collected the
bodies of Lama and Hayya on a donkey cart.
“The neighbors ran trying to save Ismael, who was the only one
breathing,” she said. “They say my kids flew 40 meters before hitting
the ground.”
Ismael died Wednesday night.
At Kamal Edwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya, in northern Gaza, Mahmoud al-
Sheik, 11, was recovering from wounds he received two days before — he
thinks from a rocket fired by an Israeli warplane. Even at his age, he
is aware of how fighters and civilians are mixed together in Gaza,
saying that the bomb was aimed at the house of his neighbor, Salim
Zaqout, whom he identified as a member of Hamas.
“But Zaqout and his family evacuated the house a few days ago,”
Mahmoud said. “Can’t Israel see all these houses that are adjacent to
Zaqout’s? Now Zaqout’s house is completely destroyed, but so are other
houses that have nothing to do with Hamas.
“I have a big hole in my left hand. The doctor told me I’m fine. He
filled the hole,” Mahmoud said, “but it’s hurting. It feels like fire
inside it.”
.
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