The Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) has continued to violate international law in its treatment of civilians in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), especially in the Gaza Strip. IOF's sanctions and siege of the Strip continue to prevent the access of more than 1,000 Palestinians to urgent hospital services outside Gaza.
In addition, IOF regularly hinder medical teams' work and humiliate them. Yesterday, IOF put the lives of a medical team at extreme endanger. According to Al Mezan's field investigations, at approximately 12:30am on 20 November 2007, IOF prevented ambulances from searching for the corpses of two Palestinians near the northern border, west of Erez Crossing, for many hours. The two men had been killed by IOF earlier at approximately 3am on the same day. They were identified as 20-year-old Guevara Muhammad Salah and 22-year-old Ahmed Abu Sitta.
At approximately 11am an ambulance arrived at the scene of the incident near the former settlement of Nizant after IOF gave them clearance to collect the corpses. Inside the ambulance were the medic Muhammad Nassar and the driver Khalil Al Sidawi. IOF gave them directions to search in that place on foot, which they did until IOF told them it was the wrong place. IOF then instructed them to go to another location north to the nearby Bedouin Village, where they ordered them to abandon the ambulance and start to search near the border on foot.
One of the members told Al Mezan that that an IOF officer instructed them to walk northward until they reached the borderline, where they met seven persons who "looked like journalists", they said. "They had cameras and near them a van carrying satellite dish", they added. The team followed the IOF's instructions and, when they reached a spot near the borderline, they found the corpses on the ground.
The same officer ordered them to remove all the weapons and grenades from the dead men and put them in a black trash can near the borderline. They then ordered them to carry the trashcan and put it near a small gate in the border fence. IOF then ordered them to carry wooden ladders that were near the corpses and leave them near the gate before giving them the permission to return to the ambulance with the corpses. As they carried the corpses to the ambulance, which was two kilometers from the location, two military vehicles approached them. The soldiers ordered them remove the dead men's clothes and give it to them. They were then given the permission to proceed with carrying the corpses.
IOF's siege of Gaza continues to prevent their access to urgent hospital services outside Gaza. The conditions of many patients has deteriorated, especially those suffering cancer disease. Patients have to wait for long times to receive a response for their application for a permit from IOF to leave Gaza. For many of those, treatment has become hopeless as their disease advanced to an extent that renders it incurable. This has been the case of Faten Shaheen, who died recently in Gaza. Shaheen had applied for a permit, but IOF refused her application for two months. When she was given the permit, doctors found her condition hopeless and advised her to return to Gaza. Two days after she returned she died.
Al Mezan also documented the case of Nail Al Kurdi, who died of cancer on 17 November 2007. Al Kurdi had applied for a permit to go to an Israeli hospital, but his request was rejected many times by IOF. Additionally, 8-year-old Ameer Al Yazjy died in Gaza on 19 November 2007. Al Yaziji was granted a permit to enter Israel, but IOF refused to allow his parents of relatives to go with him, so he returned to Gaza, where he died.
Al Mezan Center strongly condemns IOF's maltreatment of Palestinian medical teams and putting their life at risk. The Center condemns IOF's siege that has exacerbated the humanitarian crisis lived by the population. Such practices represent serious violations of IHL and human rights standards, under which Israel bears clear obligations towards the civilian population.
As such, Al Mezan calls upon the international community to intervene and pressure Israel to lift the indiscriminate sanctions and collective punishment it imposes on Gaza; especially as these measures have had drastic violations of the human rights to of civilians. Al Mezan asserts that sacrificing human rights for political gains is not an adequate approach, both in both legal and ethical terms. The silence of the international community towards such violations has only served to exacerbate them and must therefore stop.