Tragedy was averted for a little boy in Gaza thanks to his Turkish citizenship, but many Palestinian patients needing urgent medical care whose needs cannot be met in Gaza hospitals are denied entry into Israel, where they can receive specialized treatment, due to "security reasons," according to regional human rights groups and residents.

Four-year-old Mustafa Cuma from Gaza stands with his brother Ahmet (R) before he suffered from a nearly fatal head trauma in an accident in September 2007. The smaller photo shows him after the accident.
In September, four-year-old Mustafa Cuma from Gaza, who was suffering from a nearly fatal head injury, was let into Tel Aviv along with his mother, Reema Cuma, only after Turkish authorities intervened. Mustafa, who had sustained severe trauma to the head in an accident, had to be taken to an Israeli hospital immediately because his injury required a complicated operation that no hospital in Gaza could undertake. He was given clearance, but Israeli officials in Erez did not let any of his family members enter Tel Aviv to accompany the little child, according to his father, Macit Cuma.

Left without any other choice, they sent the boy in an ambulance to Tel Aviv's Ekhlof Hospital in the company of strangers. Luckily, three days later the boy's mother was able to obtain a permit to see her child in the hospital, after the Turkish Embassy in Tel Aviv intervened. However, a follow-up appointment given to the boy could not be organized for two months because of the same problem. "They did not allow any of our family members to accompany him. He is only four and he gets very scared traveling with strangers. Crying is also potentially damaging to his brain," said Macit Cuma.

The Turkish government intervened one more time, after the family wrote to the Office of the President of the Republic of Turkey. Ekrem Cuma, Mustafa's uncle, said Israeli officials at the Erez checkpoint phoned the family on Thursday, saying one of the parents would be allowed in. "I think it is because the presidential office intervened," Ekrem Cuma said.

On Friday, an official at the Turkish Embassy confirmed for Today's Zaman that Mustafa's tragedy was nearly solved and that he would be taken to an Israeli hospital in the company of his family within the next few days. However not everybody is as lucky as Mustafa, who holds Turkish citizenship. Hospitals in Gaza cannot provide many advanced services and serious cases are often referred for specialized treatment to hospitals in Israel, which is becoming increasingly difficult.

As part of its policy of isolating the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, Israel is barring increasing numbers of Palestinians from leaving the area for urgent medical care, according to claims from Gaza residents and figures compiled by human rights groups.

The number of patients being denied access to hospitals across the border with officials citing security reasons has indeed been on the rise since Hamas took control of Gaza in June, said Christoph Harnisch, head of the Delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Tel Aviv, which deals with individual applications from people in severe condition, in a telephone interview with Today’s Zaman.

Although Israeli authorities assert that current restrictions on Gaza crossings are not connected to a decision of the Israeli Cabinet ministers in September to declare Gaza a “hostile entity,” humanitarian organizations working in the region suggest otherwise.

In a press release they issued in October of last year, human rights group Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-Israel), claimed that “passage of Palestinian patients to any location outside Gaza for medical care unavailable there has been increasingly limited, and the number of patients refused for ‘security reasons’ is rising.” The group said that between July and September 2007, 138 people appealed to PHR-Israel whose requests for access to medical care were rejected by the Israeli authorities, in comparison to 66 such appeals received between March and May 2007.

In the past two months, 53 people in need of urgent medical assistance have died because of being rejected by Israeli officials due to security reasons, said Ali Nazlı, the Deputy Chairman of the Popular Committee Against Siege (PCAS), a civil society group seeking to extend humanitarian assistance to Gazans chaired by Palestinian member of parliament Jamal N. El-Khoudary. Officials at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestine confirmed this number for Today’s Zaman.

On the other hand, Amit Zarouk, the press spokesperson for the Israeli Embassy in Ankara, said that Palestinians denied entry to Israel on security grounds would be allowed in for treatment only in “life-threatening” cases. He claimed Israel in general allowed medical supplies into Gaza and assisted in humanitarian matters, despite the Israeli Cabinet having declared the Gaza Strip a “hostile territory” in September.


12.01.2008