Far from the violence, Gaza’s wounded find care at Cairo hospital

CAIRO - Ms Ilham Majid was praying when bombs fell on her Gaza house, and her husband found her hours later under the rubble – alive but seriously wounded.

Seventeen family members, including two of her children, were killed in that fateful

Oct 31 raid in the Jabalia refugee camp

of northern Gaza.

It was where Israel has been fighting Hamas militants following deadly attacks earlier that month.

Now, like a number of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, Ms Majid is receiving medical treatment in Egypt.

“All of a sudden, I felt the house crumbling. Three storeys collapsed on top of me,” the 42-year-old recalled from her hospital bed at Cairo’s Nasser hospital.

“I got shrapnel all over my body. My liver was hit, my leg, ribs and my jaw are all broken. I cannot walk.”

Ms Majid said her husband found her trapped under the rubble of the house by chance 4½ hours later, thanks to one of her fingers sticking out.

“I almost could not breathe – almost dead,” she said.

Her 15-year-old daughter was killed in the bombardment, and 10 days later, the body of her 17-year-old son was pulled from under the debris. It was already rotting.

Ever since the tragedy that ripped apart her family – 50 relatives were staying at the house when it was hit – Ms Majid has been looking at pictures of her son on her mobile phone.

Since early October, a number of Palestinians wounded in Israel’s bombardment of the Gaza Strip, and some suffering various illnesses, have been authorised to leave the besieged territory and

travel to Egypt for medical care

.

More than 15,500 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in Gaza

since fighting began on Oct 7

, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.

Israel unleashed an air and ground campaign

against the densely populated territory with the aim of destroying Hamas, after the militants broke through Gaza’s militarised border into Israel.

The unprecedented attacks by the Palestinian group killed about 1,200 people, also mostly civilians, while around 240 others were taken hostage, according to the Israeli authorities.

The war on Gaza has devastated swathes of the coastal territory, levelled entire neighbourhoods and destroyed much of the infrastructure, including hospitals.

Even before

fighting resumed on Dec 1

after a week-long pause during which militants released hostages in exchange for prisoners held by Israel, Gaza’s health system was on its knees with hospitals resembling a “horror movie”, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Now it is “catastrophic”, the UN agency has said.

Currently, only 18 of Gaza’s 36 hospitals are even minimally to partially functional, with the three main hospitals in the north barely operative, Dr Richard Peeperkorn, WHO’s representative in the Palestinian territories, told reporters in Geneva via video-link from Gaza on Dec 1.

The United Nations says not a single hospital in northern Gaza can carry out surgery after several were attacked by Israel, while those in the south are overwhelmed by the number of casualties they receive daily.

At Cairo’s Nasser hospital, patients such as Ms Majid are trying to slowly regain their strength far away from the violence and chaos consuming Gaza.

Yussef, 13, lay in a bed staring into the distance, his face puffy. Dried blood stained his right leg, which was held together with metal rods.

“He was in a complete state of shock when I found him” under the rubble of their four-storey home in the Shati refugee camp, said his older brother.

In another hospital room down the corridor, Ms Lubna al-Shafei, 36, said she was being treated for a “neck wound”.

“On Oct 23, our house in the centre of Gaza City was destroyed. My son was killed, and my husband was wounded,” she said.

On Nov 29, the Egyptian Health Ministry announced the launch of an initiative aimed at providing medical care for 1,000 children wounded in Gaza.

Already, 28 premature babies who were trapped at Al-Shifa hospital, Gaza’s largest, which was besieged and ultimately raided by Israeli forces, have been taken to Egypt.

The United Arab Emirates and Tunisia have also taken in Palestinians wounded in Gaza, namely children in need of medical care.

France and Italy have sent ships to Egypt to serve as hospitals for wounded civilians from Gaza. AFP