God bless them – Peter
Volunteer medical staff on the ground in the conflict zone recount horrific injuries and a civilian population trapped without food.
A young girl lies on an operating table in a hospital in Gaza. She has lost the use of both of her legs from a bomb blast. A British surgeon, Graeme Groom, is about to amputate both legs to save her life. But he does not know her name because she is one of so many patients he will treat each day.
“It’s shaming for me and appalling for humanity that a seven-year-old child can have both her legs blown off and just be the next one on the conveyor belt,” he says.
“We can heal her residual legs, and she will not die if we can feed her. But when she’s discharged, she will go – if she has family – to a tent where there will be no food. She will have no chance of prosthetic legs at the moment. She will go through life, however long that may be, totally changed.”
Groom shows me a photograph of this child in London, where he is based at King’s College Hospital, because I have asked to talk to him about his work as a volunteer surgeon. He is a medical expert with years of experience in limb reconstruction. He is also a witness to Gaza – a war zone few can see. Few journalists can enter. Most diplomats are barred. Groom, and a small number of volunteers like him, can tell us about the reality of this war.
Now, with Israel intent on full control of Gaza despite international calls for a ceasefire, hearing these accounts feels more urgent than ever.
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