Chicago audience 'shell shocked' by doctor's presentation of Gaza under attack
I was a bit nervous ten minutes before the program was to start and only 20 people were seated in the cavernous Rockefeller Chapel at the University of Chicago. Perhaps people really have forgotten Gaza. Maybe they don't want to be reminded that for 23 days, Israel carried out a planned, brutal assault that flattened buildings and shattered lives.
Maybe they don't want to hear from someone who spent two weeks in Gaza elbow deep in blood, repairing small bodies and comforting weeping relatives. Maybe people have moved on - eager for a new diplomatic initiative or perhaps onto the next tragedy - Afghanistan and Pakistan where the blood seems more fresh. Maybe they are more interested in the work of pirates rather than those who use governmental power to attack civilians and then continue to hold them under siege so reconstruction efforts are hampered.
I was wrong about the interest. Within the next half hour, the chapel slowly filled with people, perhaps reaching 200. Lots of college students, women in headscarves, and Arab families - young children in tow - sat spellbound as Mads Gilbert (pictured right in al-Shifa Hospital , photo from the Lancet), a Norwegian doctor who has spent several decades working with Palestinians, shared with the audience his most recent experience working at al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza at the end of December when the timed Israeli assault began. more at the Palestine Telegraph
Health, Human Rights, and the War on Gaza: Evidence from the Frontlines
"WE'RE WADING IN BLOOD" On Jan 3, 2009,
Dr. Mads Gilbert sent a text message to the world:
"They bombed the central fruit and vegetables market in Gaza town two hours ago. 80 wounded and 20 killed. All of them came here, to Shifa. Hades! We are up to our knees with death, blood and amputants. Lots of children. Pregnant women. I have never experienced anything this terrible. Tell people, pass it on, shout it from the rooftops. Everything. WE MUST DO MORE! We are living in the history books now, everyone!”
—Mads Gilbert, Gaza,
Palestine Dr. Gilbert is a professor and physician based in Tromsoe, Norway and has participated in and organized numerous international emergency medical missions and training projects in war and post-conflict zones in Lebanon, West Bank, Gaza, Iran, Burma, Cambodia, Afghanistan, and Angola. During the most recent conflict in Gaza, Dr. Gilbert on emergency assignment for the Norwegian Aid Committee (NORWAC), was one of a few foreign physicians on the ground, at a period foreign journalists were barred from entering Gaza. Dr. Gilbert has published several articles in The Lancet based on his recent observations and experience as a physician and human rights activist in Gaza.
He has been interviewed extensively by the international media, including CNN, BBC and Al-Jazeera to discuss his experiences and will be releasing a book in May that documents the humanitarian and health impact of the most recent disaster in Gaza on the Palestinian population. Dr. Quentin Young is Co-Founder of PNHP and former physician to Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. Young is a continued leader in public health policy and medical and social justice issues.
In 1998, he had the special distinction of serving as President of the American Public Health Association and in 1997 was inducted as a Master of the American College of Physicians.
In 1980, Dr. Young founded the Chicago based Health & Medicine Policy Research Group, of which he is currently Chairman.
See also Dime bombs were used on Gaza civilians, with video report of Dr Eric Fosse at Al-Shifa hospital
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