Doctors Without Borders Calls for Release of Palestinian Healthcare Workers Detained by Israel

Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, has called for the immediate release of Palestinian healthcare workers imprisoned by Israel.

The NGO said in a statement on Monday that it was “outraged by the treatment of healthcare workers, most of whom are being detained in dire conditions, without justification or cause”.

MSF highlighted the case of Dr Hussam Abu Safia, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, who is in solitary confinement and has reportedly been tortured since being detained by Israel more than a year and a half ago.

His treatment “follows an appalling pattern of the Israeli authorities detaining and targeting medical staff across Palestine”, the organisation said.

The Physicians for Human Rights Israel group reports that more than 50 healthcare workers are currently being held in inhumane conditions by Israel, including 15 doctors. It has petitioned the Israeli Supreme Court for their release.

According to Healthcare Workers Watch figures from April, 446 Palestinian healthcare workers have been unlawfully detained by Israeli forces since Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza began on October 7, 2023. Six have reportedly been killed in detention, their bodies still held by Israel.

MSF also called for the “immediate and unconditional release” of orthopaedic surgeon Dr Mohammed Obeid, who has been imprisoned for more than 600 days, after being arrested while working at Kamal Adwan Hospital.

MSF noted that “for too long, too many world leaders have failed to condemn Israel’s conduct in Palestine. Silence has become complicity”.

It added that all arbitrarily detained medical personnel must be granted access to adequate medical care and dignified conditions pending their release from detention.

Earlier this month, a UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry ⁠on the Occupied Palestinian Territory and the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention both called for Israel to release Abu Safia, and all medical personnel arbitrarily detained.

His lawyer, Nasser Odeh, warned that the doctor’s health was in danger, and that he showed signs of regular torture. Israel is holding the paediatrician without trial, having classed him as an “unlawful combatant”.

Before he was abducted by Israeli forces, Abu Safia had been a prominent voice highlighting the effects of Israel’s war on Gaza’s healthcare system.