Horror and death have become the daily lives of the 2.3 million inhabitants of Gaza since the Hamas attack on Israel. About 30 foreign aid workers from Doctors Without Borders help the Palestinian population and try to save lives while also trying to save their own.. EL MUNDO interviews by telephone the only Spaniard who serves on this team, Raúl Inciertis, a 40-year-old Valencian who until now had not seen death so close, despite having worked in Afghanistan and more risky destinations.
Ask. What is the situation like now in Gaza?
Answer. It's a horrible situation because the street is not a safe place at all. There is no safe place here. The population is being bombed without warning. And sometimes the alarms sound and a few seconds later you hear the planes and the bombs start to fall.
Q. Where are the Doctors Without Borders staff?
R. Until Tuesday I was in a flat with nine other roommates, but the situation was unsustainable.. On Saturday, after the Hamas attacks, Israeli bombs began to fall, some 300 meters from our house. The night from Monday to Tuesday was terrifying: bombs fell every eight or 10 minutes.. I have never heard anything like the screams of horror from the children on the next floor every time a bomb exploded and the entire building shook.. On Tuesday, they [30 foreign workers from Doctors Without Borders] were moved to the basement of the UN building for the development of Palestine. We slept on mattresses on the floor with other aid workers and United Nations workers.. We are safer. But it is a frustrating relief because the population outside is not safe and continues to die.
Q. What was your job here before?
R. I am an anesthetist and I worked caring for people shot by Israeli snipers from the wall at the Al Awda hospital.. Every day, many men and young people went to the wall that Israel built to throw stones at the wall and at the Israeli soldiers.. They respond by shooting at the ankles of the Palestinians to mutilate them. In the hospital, we performed orthopedic surgery, amputated legs or reconstructed them. Between five and eight gunshot wounds arrived to us a day.
Q. And what is your job now?
A. Now they don't allow us to leave the basement where we are. From here we prepare teams of medical supplies for the hospitals in Gaza, such as Al Shifa, the largest and most important, which our local collaborators distribute in the few moments when things seem to be calm.
Q. Gaza is now suffering from a general power outage and a blockade of all types of materials. What is the situation like in hospitals?
A. The situation is terrible. No one is safe in Gaza: four hospitals have been affected by the effects of the bombings. Up to 18 ambulances have been destroyed or damaged by bombs; They are not initially targeted, but they can be targeted if they pass through an area that is under attack. And, as far as we know, six health workers have died.. We know that they are considering not taking the sick in ambulances because they are not safe at all. In the hospitals they no longer have electricity and they work with the diesel generators they have, but in the main hospital, Al Shifa, there is only fuel left for two days. Medical staff work 24 hours non-stop and are exhausted. Finally, they are running out of health equipment, serum, medicines…. that we try to provide them.
Raúl Uncertis.
Q. Isn't it possible that they also provide other types of medical assistance?
R. We are exploring the possibility of moving medical teams to public hospitals but, at the moment, due to the constant bombings, we cannot do so.. There is a lot of risk in the journey itself. If the situation calms down, we would consider doing so.
Q. How did you find out about the Hamas attack on Saturday?
A. I was watching the news on my cell phone and a colleague confirmed it to me. Immediately, we began to hear bomb warnings and projectiles began to fall all over the city. Some, 300 meters from the Doctors Without Borders apartment. I have experienced bombings in other conflict zones, but it is nothing like here: first you hear the planes coming, then the impact of the bombs. The buildings shake as if they are about to fall. Your head is shaking. whole body…
Q. Have you never experienced anything like this?
R. It's the worst thing I've ever experienced. And I know it's the worst thing I'm going to experience. You have the feeling that everything can collapse and destroy on your head in a minute. And that happens with every bomb. The screams of the children are terrifying, they live in a permanent hell, sometimes with bombings every eight minutes…
Q. You've only been in Gaza for 12 days, but do you know anyone who has died or lost loved ones?
R. Yes Yes! A worker from the Gaza Ministry of Health who collaborated with us daily has died in the bombings. The head of Logistics of Doctors Without Borders in Belgium has completely lost his home.. Some local Doctors Without Borders staff have died, are caring for injured family members or have lost loved ones.
Basement of the UN building where international aid workers working in Gaza sleep.
Q. Are you safe in the UN building?
R. Here you feel like your life has been saved, a certain relief. But this false relief is accompanied by a very frustrating feeling: the local aid workers with whom I work daily, everyone is away. And they all have families, eyes, mouths, hearts, children… And they are not safe. Nobody is now in Gaza.
Q. What solution do you see for the current situation?
A. The only way out is for Israel to open humanitarian corridors. Doctors Without Borders is calling for it to be done so that civilians and children can flee to Egypt. The tour we took of our house here was brief, but I was able to see destroyed buildings, burned cars, razed blocks… They can't leave the entire population locked up here without being able to leave.
Q. How many Spaniards are there in Gaza?
R. There are only three of us Spaniards: a local Red Cross aid worker, another boy who I don't know where he worked, and me.. The consul of Spain, Ignacio, has created a WhatsApp chat and every day he asks us how we are.
Q. Everything he tells is suffocating. If you could, would you leave the country now?
Q. That is not possible because it depends on the will of Israel and it has said that nothing is going to enter here and that no one is going to leave.. Border crossings have been bombed and are closed. If that corridor were opened, we could go to Egypt. But it is also important that we are here so that someone can tell what is happening in Palestine.
Surrounded by rubble and destruction, hospitals in the Gaza Strip are on the brink of collapse amid a general power outage that adds to the shortage of materials, medicines and medical personnel, compromising the care of the more than 5,000 injured in the Palestinian enclave.
“Our capacity is at the limit and we can only try to maintain the lives of the wounded,” Dr. Medhat Abbas, spokesperson for the Al Shifa Medical Complex, the largest hospital in Gaza City, told Efe.
Since the Islamist movement Hamas – which de facto rules the Strip – surprised Israel last Saturday with an unprecedented attack by land, air and sea, the Israeli Army has counterattacked with incessant bombings on 2,687 targets, many of them militia structures. , but also homes, mosques and other civil facilities.
The enclave's electric company cut off the electricity supply this Wednesday at 2:00 p.m. (11:00 GMT), since the only plant in the Strip has run out of fuel.
The enclave only has 300,000 liters of fuel left, which covers just 10 hours of light, and which is currently reserved until Israel accepts that Egypt send fuel through the Rafah crossing, so the power outage could last several days.
This rationing will affect critical areas of hospitals such as intensive care units, maternity wards and other departments, while lighting will be reduced to a minimum.
The Palestinian Health Ministry called on the international community to put pressure on Israel to allow in essential fuel and medical supplies.
In previous escalations, humanitarian aid could be supplied through the Rafah crossing, bordering Egypt, but Israel refuses that possibility for the moment and the crossing has been closed since Tuesday, when the Israeli Army bombed the area, forcing backing into a vehicle transporting fuel nearby.
The injured have also not been able to be transported to Egyptian hospitals, while numerous Gazans, many of them with dual nationality, desperately seek to leave the Strip and face waiting lists of at least four weeks.