Imtiaz Sooliman – Gaza’s Humanitarian Crisis I IsraeliPalestine violence continues
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The speaker discusses a counseling facility that supports children with wheelchairs and organ transplantation and their willingness to help veterans find housing. They also emphasize the need for patience and guidance in finding ways to help veterans navigate their densely populated areas, with 1.7 million people in an area 10 kilometers long and twice the population of New York City. The speakers emphasize the importance of buying and maintaining health facilities for the upcoming war, as the coronavirus pandemic may cause more casualties and hospitalizations.
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As a counseling facility does, from a counseling looks after
kids. It has a preschool. And of course, we've been supporting
injured people with wheelchairs prosthesis. We do organ
transplantation in the country. We support medical supplies to the
hospitals and whenever, even if you can buy to support them, and
food parcels for the widows, food parcel for the poor, debt relief
does they've got three desalination plants. Now, with
that presence on site in Gaza, it gives us an advantage. First of
all, after this war, is going to be more than 200,000 right now,
children required from our consulate. We have a facility to
assist with that. But I mean, that's long term. Immediately, the
first day, within the first few hours, we bought whatever medical
stops available and took it to the hospitals that required the
medical support. And we're still doing that on an ongoing basis.
Whoever can get stopped, we make it available, we buy it, we get it
to hospitals only. We'll just, you know, immediate support. We do
that. We've already been supplied food to the homes that been
affected. We visited the victims in the hospitals. We provided them
with cash for themselves and for their families and any additional
eight our desalination plants are providing more water. It's not
easy for the trucks to move, because the bombing is continuous,
but when we can and when it's possible and when we can move, our
water plants are more busy to provide more water for more areas.
The hospitals, if they have a shortage of money for fuel, when
they can get it, we can really pay for that. So there's a range of
things that we're doing right now. We try to find buildings safer
from the front lines, where we can put people up for accommodation.
And if we can't find a building, we already look at available
apartments where we will pay the rent for six months or longer for
those displaced to stay in those apartments. Now, in particular,
the Gaza Strip is one of the most densely populated places on Earth,
with about, you know, 1.7 million people in an area only 10
kilometers wide by 40 kilometers long. And it's said to have a
population density twice that of New York City in the United
States. So with the violence that's currently raging on Doctor
Suleiman, I would imagine mobility is restricted. I mean navigating
around these massive groups. So just how difficult is it getting
food aid and other forms of aid to these people?
It's very, very complicated. It's not easy. Sometimes of these
people cannot get any food, but the Palestinians are adapted,
finding ways they look they're not they're not a scared nation.
They're very brave nation, and they will do anything to help each
other. They will risk their lives. They will move around. They'll do
that. You'll see them do the funerals while the bombings taking
place. They're not afraid to do that. You know. They will carry
people from the injured places while the bombs are falling and
take them to hospital. It's been years, and they found a way around
it and to them, it doesn't matter if their lives lost in the process
of saving somebody else's life. Now you have a blood shortage, you
will soon see 1000s of them to provide blood, to give the blood
donations for people they don't even know, you know. So they will
get the food supplies. And even the over the years, the
shopkeepers are very adapt at finding ways of getting food
parcels to an address that you give them. Of course, most of this
is occluded now, with the bombing taking place in certain parts of
the country, but it's a process. It requires patience. It's
sometimes very difficult. By people like yesterday, we lost
continued, complete communication with them. We said there was no
electricity. There was bombing. We couldn't send the images. We
couldn't talk to you. We couldn't get through a motorcycle. Can't
move. A motorcycle is struck. Ambulance are hit, Gaza hit. So
when there's a little there's an opportunity in those shoe minutes,
it's used very effectively to deliver what needs to be
delivered. You know, the flare up could get worse. Suleiman, I mean,
if Israel decides to launch ground offensive into the Gaza Strip, and
I'm told that Israel officials are still reportedly considering this
option, with tanks and heavy artillery close to the territory's
northern perimeter and already involved in the fighting, just how
prepared are humanitarian organizations like yours for the
escalation of violence and the subsequent increase in casualties?
It's not like we haven't been there before. You know it's it's
from 2009 more. The only difference, guys that are not
sending teams in the 2000 and what we are teams there in 2014 we are
teams there, but because of the covid cases, they wanted lockdown.
And of course, more importantly, our teams are required in South
Africa as we enter the third wave. So it's irrational for us to take
our teams across when we need them in our own country. So this time
is remote support, no, for whatever we can do, any
international disaster is remote support. Yes, artillery will cause
more incursion into Gaza will cause more deaths. It's not
something new, so something we haven't seen before, in the 2009
that 1000s of them died, even 2000 14,000
died, and 1000s more were injured, and the hospitals were doctors
were affected right now, even bond hospitals. It's a characteristic
of Israeli army to attack hospitals, civilian sites,
ambulances, doctors, mosques. You know, it's something not new. It's
done for years, and already a few hospitals have been destroyed.
Indonesian Hospital, which I saw personally myself when I was dead,
2014
another hospitals have been hit.
So probably many more hospitals and ambulances will be in the next
coming days. So yes, where when the troops coming? There's only
more casualties, more people are dying. It just means providing
more supplies. The only develop, the biggest challenge is to get
those supplies, because of the blockade and difficulty that's
accessing goods. You have to buy whatever's available in the
country, and by somebody call it some business, then it's sharp
enough and get to stop it. You can get it, or you need to open its
borders, or, you know, you can get supplies from there. But at at
some point, excessive supplies becomes very, very difficult. May
the health system is strained already, and as we've mentioned,
as a result of the covid 19 and the Israel authorities had closed
the areas crossing in the north of the Gaza Strip. Should we brace
ourselves for a further degeneration of the humanitarian
situation there?
Yes. I mean what each day. Remember, less fuel, more bombs,
more wounded, less supplies, more health facilities affected. Less
water available, less electricity available. That only compounds a
problem. You can't take wooded people out of the country for care
like they used to do normally. But I think if it opens borders to be
able to take some people out that way, but normally, they used to
take to their crossings, fly them to Turkey, to 4k and, you know,
get supplies. But all this is not going to happen this time. You
know, it's very unlikely that's going to happen. And many, many
people are going to die simply, not only because of the bombing,
but because of not die directly from the bombing, but die
indirectly because they've been injured. They could be saved, but
because they don't have the supplies, they will die because of
that. Under normal circumstances, they could be saved, but they
won't got a Suleman, great. Chatting to you. Thank you so much
for your time. That was a gift of the givers. Founder, Dr imtia
Suleiman, joining us live via zoom. You.