Gaza health official detained by Israeli undercover force
An Israeli undercover force reportedly has 'abducted' Marwan al-Hams, a senior Gaza Health Ministry official, in Rafah on Monday. According to the health ministry, al-Hams was captured outside the field hospital of the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Video Duration 00 minutes 38 seconds 00:38
Video Duration 00 minutes 44 seconds 00:44
Video Duration 01 minutes 46 seconds 01:46
Video Duration 01 minutes 24 seconds 01:24
Video Duration 00 minutes 58 seconds 00:58
Video Duration 01 minutes 18 seconds 01:18
Video Duration 02 minutes 24 seconds 02:24
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Al Jazeera
8 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
Gaza health official detained by Israeli undercover force
Gaza health official detained by Israeli undercover force NewsFeed An Israeli undercover force reportedly has 'abducted' Marwan al-Hams, a senior Gaza Health Ministry official, in Rafah on Monday. According to the health ministry, al-Hams was captured outside the field hospital of the International Committee of the Red Cross. Video Duration 00 minutes 38 seconds 00:38 Video Duration 00 minutes 44 seconds 00:44 Video Duration 01 minutes 46 seconds 01:46 Video Duration 01 minutes 24 seconds 01:24 Video Duration 00 minutes 58 seconds 00:58 Video Duration 01 minutes 18 seconds 01:18 Video Duration 02 minutes 24 seconds 02:24
Al Jazeera
10 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
In Gaza, death seems easier than amputation
'Ten children a day losing a limb in Gaza, warns UN-backed body', this is the latest horrific headline to come out of Gaza. The article reports: '134,105 people including over 40,500 children have suffered new war-related injuries since the war began in October 2023.' Behind these shocking statistics are real children in real pain who have lost a part of their body, their childhood and their dreams. My 12-year-old relative Osama is one of them. He escaped death twice, but each time he lost part of his family until only he remained. The first time, he was at his grandparents' house, along with his mother, grandmother and sisters. An Israeli air strike hit the home, killing everyone except Osama. The second time, he was at a school-turned-shelter when Israel bombed it. His father and seven uncles were all killed. Osama survived but lost his leg. My father and I visited him at Al-Aqsa Hospital to check on him. At the gate of the hospital, a child greeted us; he was selling water in a plastic bag, holding it with one hand; his other hand was amputated. Inside, the scene at the ward where Osama was admitted was gut-wrenching. Dozens of amputees were lying on beds and on the floor. We found Osama lying in his bed. He spent most of the visit crying. Every movement was difficult for him. The pain I saw on his face cannot be described. A child who lost his mother, father and his siblings now had to face the trauma and pain of an amputation utterly alone. He had to rely on the charity of relatives for everything. He was cared for and supported; someone was constantly in search of a wheelchair for him. But in times of war, taking care of a wounded child who cannot even go to the toilet by himself is an overwhelming weight even for those who love him. Not because they do not want to help, but because they themselves are barely surviving. Osama knew that. 'I want to go to mama and baba … and play in heaven,' he whispered. His words broke my heart. To be a child without a limb means living an unfair life. It means needing help for every move, every step, every simple activity. It means always feeling different, being looked at with pity or discomfort, watching other children run and play without being able to join. Many, like Osama, have to endure all this without the support of their mom, dad, sisters and brothers. I cannot begin to comprehend what Osama must feel. But I do know what I myself felt when I nearly escaped an amputation. In June last year, our home was attacked and my family and I were all injured. I had shrapnel lodged into various parts of my body, including my hand. I was rushed to the hospital. My first thought when I heard I needed urgent surgery was that I could lose my hand. It was my right hand. The hand I use to write my dreams. The one I open my notebooks and hold my books with. The one I use to help my mother, to hold my phone and write to my friends and the relatives I cannot see. How could I live without it? How would I go on as a writer, as a translator, as a woman who still dared to dream amid all this destruction? In that moment, I felt what Osama had felt too: Death would be easier than losing a part of my body. I cried a lot in the hospital. Not only from pain, but from fear of a life in which I might no longer feel whole. The surgery saved my hand from amputation, but the shrapnel remained inside. They couldn't remove it; it was too close to the nerve, and they feared damaging it. They said it would stay there … indefinitely. A piece of shrapnel in the body, like a fragment of painful memory in the mind. A part of the war still living inside me. A piece of destruction, lodged in my body. I spent two weeks in the surgery ward, the section designated for amputation and limb fracture cases. The place was saturated with pain; not a morning passed without me waking up to the scream of a child crying from the agony of amputation, or the groans of a woman writhing in pain from a wound that refused to heal. In front of my bed, there was a woman in her 50s who had lost both her arms. She couldn't even lift a piece of bread to her mouth. Her daughter sat beside her, feeding her with a spoon as if she were a child. Her eyes were filled with tears not just from physical pain, but from that unbearable feeling of helplessness. I watched her in silence. Her image never left me. To see a human being stripped of their most basic abilities – to eat, to wash themselves, to walk – destroys the soul. War doesn't just kill. It steals. It steals land, homes, loved ones, it still limbs, it steals souls. The pain doesn't end when you survive. It begins when you are left to live with what's missing, what's broken, with a body that will never be the same. And if death sometimes feels easier than losing a part of your body, then the life we choose to live afterwards is resistance in its purest form. The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial stance.
Al Jazeera
10 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
Belgian police question Israelis over alleged Gaza war crimes
Belgian authorities have interrogated two members of the Israeli military following allegations of serious breaches of international humanitarian law committed in Gaza, the Federal Prosecutor's Office in Brussels said. The two people were questioned after legal complaints were filed by the Hind Rajab Foundation and the Global Legal Action Network. The complaints were submitted on Friday and Saturday as the soldiers attended the Tomorrowland music festival in Belgium. 'In light of this potential jurisdiction, the Federal Prosecutor's Office requested the police to locate and interrogate the two individuals named in the complaint,' said the prosecutor's office in a written statement on Monday. 'Following these interrogations, they were released.' The questioning was carried out under a new provision in Belgium's Code of Criminal Procedure, which came into effect last year. It allows Belgian courts to investigate alleged violations abroad if the acts fall under international treaties ratified by Belgium – including the 1949 Geneva Conventions and the 1984 UN Convention Against Torture. The prosecutor's office said it would not release further information at this stage of the investigation. The Hind Rajab Foundation, based in Belgium, has been campaigning for legal action against Israeli soldiers over alleged war crimes in Gaza. It is named after a six-year-old Palestinian girl who was killed by Israeli fire while fleeing Gaza City with her family early in Israel's war on Gaza. Since its formation last year, the foundation has filed dozens of complaints in more than 10 countries, targeting both low- and high-ranking Israeli military personnel. The group hailed Monday's developments as 'a turning point in the global pursuit of accountability'. 'We will continue to support the ongoing proceedings and call on Belgian authorities to pursue the investigation fully and independently,' the foundation said in a statement. 'Justice must not stop here – and we are committed to seeing it through.' 'At a time when far too many governments remain silent, this action sends a clear message: credible evidence of international crimes must be met with legal response – not political indifference,' the statement added. Israel's Foreign Ministry confirmed the incident, saying that one Israeli citizen and one soldier were interrogated and later released. 'Israeli authorities dealt with this issue and are in touch with the two,' the ministry said in a statement cited by The Associated Press news agency. The incident comes amid growing international outrage over Israel's conduct in its war on Gaza. More than two dozen Western countries called for an immediate end to the war in Gaza on Monday, saying that suffering there had 'reached new depths'. After more than 21 months of fighting that have triggered catastrophic humanitarian conditions for Gaza's more than two million people, Israeli allies Britain, France, Australia, Canada and 21 other countries, plus the European Union, said in a joint statement that the war 'must end now'. 'The suffering of civilians in Gaza has reached new depths,' the signatories added, urging a negotiated ceasefire, the release of captives held by Palestinian armed groups and the free flow of much-needed aid. On Sunday, the World Food Programme accused Israel of using tanks, snipers and other weapons to fire on a crowd of Palestinians seeking food aid. It said that shortly after crossing through the northern Zikim crossing into Gaza, its 25-truck convoy encountered large crowds of civilians waiting for food supplies, who were attacked. 'As the convoy approached, the surrounding crowd came under fire from Israeli tanks, snipers and other gunfire,' it said on X, adding that the incident resulted in the loss of 'countless lives' with many more suffering critical injuries. 'These people were simply trying to access food to feed themselves and their families on the brink of starvation. This terrible incident underscores the increasingly dangerous conditions under which humanitarian operations are forced to be conducted in Gaza.' Gaza's Health Ministry described the Israeli attack, which killed at least 92 people, as one of the war's deadliest days for civilians seeking humanitarian assistance. More than 59,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since Israel began its war on Gaza in October 2023, according to local health officials. Much of the territory lies in ruins, with severe shortages of food, medicine and other essentials due to Israel's ongoing blockade.
