WHO Calls for Release of over 160 Gaza Medical Workers Held by Israel


Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, seen from inside detention (Photo: Social media).

By Palestine Chronicle Staff  

Over 160 Palestinian healthcare workers, including senior doctors, remain in Israeli detention, with reports of torture, abuse, and deaths in custody.

At least 160 Palestinian healthcare workers, including more than 20 doctors, remain in Israeli custody, raising serious concerns about their safety and well-being, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Healthcare Workers Watch (HWW), a Palestinian medical NGO, reported that 162 medical personnel are still detained, among them some of Gaza’s most senior physicians. Additionally, 24 others remain missing after being taken from hospitals during the war.

Muath Alser, director of HWW, condemned the mass detention of doctors, nurses, and paramedics as a violation of international law, warning that it has severely impacted Gaza’s collapsing healthcare system.

“Israel’s targeting of the healthcare workforce in this manner is having a devastating impact on the provision of medical care to Palestinians,” Alser told The Guardian, adding that the detentions have led to “countless preventable deaths and the effective eradication of whole medical specialties.”

Abuse, Torture, and Forced Disappearances

The WHO has confirmed that 297 healthcare workers from Gaza have been detained since Israel’s war began but has not provided updated figures on those still in custody. 

Additionally, HWW estimates that 339 medical personnel have been arrested by Israeli forces.

Testimonies from released detainees describe systematic abuse in Israeli prisons. Dr. Mohammed Abu Selmia, the director of Al-Shifa Hospital, was detained for seven months before being released without charge. 

Speaking to The Guardian, he described extreme mistreatment, including beatings, starvation, and inhumane conditions.

“I was beaten so badly I couldn’t walk,” Abu Selmia said. “There was little to no food, no hygiene, no toilet. I saw people dying there.”

Dr. Hossam Abu Safiya, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, was among those detained in December. His lawyer, who recently visited him in Israel’s Ofer Prison, reported that Abu Safiya had been tortured and denied medical care.

The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has called for the immediate release of arbitrarily detained medical workers, denouncing their treatment as “enforced disappearances, torture, and other ill-treatment.”

Deaths of Gaza Doctors in Israeli Custody

Two of Gaza’s most senior doctors—Dr. Iyad al-Rantisi, a consultant obstetrician and gynecologist, and Dr. Adnan al-Bursh, head of orthopedics at Al-Shifa Hospital—have died in Israeli detention, according to reports.

The WHO has warned that ongoing detentions are worsening Gaza’s already dire healthcare crisis, with hospitals struggling to function due to a lack of staff and medical supplies.

“Health workers, the facilities they work in, and the patients they care for must never be targets,” WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, reiterating that international law mandates their protection.

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Earlier this month, an Israeli soldier was sentenced to seven months in prison for abusing Palestinian detainees—the first conviction of its kind. 

However, rights groups argue that the systemic mistreatment of prisoners, including medical personnel, continues largely unchecked.

(PC, Al Mayadeen)





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