Escaped from Al Shifa, a Palestinian surgeon recalls impossible choices

BERLIN — With the power out, the water off, medical supplies short and hundreds of war injured and sheltering Palestinians crowding the Al Shifa hospital in Gaza City, Ahmed Abunada was faced with impossible choices.

"Who do I let die, this woman or that man?... I do not have the time to do reconstructive surgery on this child, I will have to amputate," said the 47-year-old surgeon, who left Gaza earlier this month to escape the fighting between Israel and Hamas.

"These are very difficult decisions for a doctor," said the German doctor of Palestinian origin.

Abunada was received on Friday by German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier along with seven of his compatriots, who were evacuated from the Gaza Strip when the Rafah border crossing between the Palestinian territory and Egypt was opened to foreign nationals.

"We were operating on the floor, on gurneys. There were no beds left," he told AFP about his time in the hospital.

"The week that I left the hospital, the situation got worse. We had no more electricity, no more water, no more oxygen," he said.

Without oxygen it was no longer possible for Abunada to operate. "That is why I left, on the 28th day of the conflict."

Al Shifa, the largest hospital in the Gaza Strip, was a key focus for the Israeli forces, who said Hamas used a tunnel complex under the compound to stage attacks, a claim the Palestinian militants and hospital officials denied.

"I worked there as a doctor and I did not notice anything like that," Abunada said, when asked about Hamas's alleged presence at the facility.

Last week, the hospital's director Mohammad Abu Salmiya, who has been frequently quoted by international media about conditions inside the complex, was arrested by Israeli forces.

"I hope they free him soon," said Abunada.

Abunada, who did his medical studies in Germany, has lived in Gaza for the last eight years with his wife and four children, one of whom was injured before the family’s departure.

Israel, which has vowed to destroy Hamas, responded with persistent bombardments and a ground campaign, which have killed nearly 15,000 people, according to Hamas officials.

As the head of vascular surgery at Al Shifa, Abunada barely had time to rest after the war started.

“Naturally, I had to have breaks to sleep. But sleeping without being able to lie down is difficult,” he said.

“The bombardments were everywhere. It was too loud to sleep.”

On Friday, Abunada gave his account to the German president and asked for more aid to enter Gaza.

“I called for the creation of a medical air-bridge from Germany” to deliver supplies, the surgeon said.

“There are lots of German doctors of Palestinian origin. They could be made available and could help.”

Not all members of Abunada’s family have left the Gaza Strip. “My mother is there, she is 85. I worry about her a lot.” The elderly woman fled her home in Gaza to the south during the war on foot, he said.