Latest news with #Medics
The Guardian
16-07-2025
- General
- The Guardian
Kids, don't look to me for career inspiration. Look to your electrician instead
Life. Work out what you want to do with it, what kind of job you want. And then find that job. Hopefully, it won't be something that it's thought AI will do better. And, hopefully, it's a job with meaning, with a point to it. It must be great to be a doctor. What do you do? Oh, I'm a doctor. And what's the point of that? Well, I try to keep people alive. And with that the question of the point of your life is answered. Nobody, I suggest, ever expresses doubt about the purpose of doctoring. Just like nobody asks a broadcaster and writer what the point of their work is. They should. We get too much credit for what we do. Not long after I started presenting television programmes, I was invited back to my old school's speech day to give a talk. This was barely 10 years after I'd left the place, and so many of my teachers were still there. That evening remains one of the proudest days of my life. As I shook hands with the students collecting their prizes, I thought about what they'd go on to do with their lives. And then I thought about some of the wonderful things many of my own cohort were achieving. And then I thought about what I was doing here rather than any of them. Medics, engineers, aid workers, lawyers, builders and so on. Yet I was the one who'd got the nod. Don't get me wrong, I was proud of where I'd got to in my life, yet even then it felt as if my line of work conferred upon me an elevated status it didn't quite warrant. As I said, a bit too much credit. Here's why I feel this way: I'm often recognised on the street, in a pub, at a football match or wherever, and asked about my work, in the most generous of tones. I blather on for – I hope – not very long, before returning fire and asking the person what they do for a living. Their response is as interesting as it is disappointing. First, they doubt my sincerity in asking the question. They think I'm just being polite, but they are quite wrong. I am always genuinely interested. Occasionally, by the way, there's even a bit of mind-your-own-business in their response, which is a bit rich given they started the conversation. Anyway, on we go. I'm all ears. And when I do get my answer – and this is the disappointing bit – I would say that nine times out of 10 I get an apologetic shrug and a sentence that typically begins with something like, 'Oh, I'm just a …' Accountants, bless them, are particularly apologetic about their work. But, whatever the person does, it's as if it couldn't possibly compare to what I do. Nothing, in my estimation anyway, could be further from the truth. I've had some extraordinarily high-status jobs shared with me in that dot-dot-dot slot. Doctor, barrister, airline pilot etc. This is daft. But nowhere near as daft – and sad – as teachers and nurses, who don't seem noticeably proud of what they do. And then there's all the trades, the people who do useful – actually, crucial – things with their hands, such as plumbers, scaffolders, carpenters, bricklayers, electricians, heating engineers and so on. When I get to observe them at work, it's akin to seeing something like closeup magic performed. I look on in wonder, seriously. And I think the status of jobs is going to change, thanks to AI. It looks as though white-collar jobs are vulnerable. Recruiters of graduates are holding back from hiring. Even the likes of doctors, broadcasters, barristers and airline pilots could find some of their work being done for them. But, as far as I can see, no form of AI is going to fix your toilet, wire your house or build you a wall. Plumbers, electricians, bricklayers – I wish more than ever that I had your skill sets rather than my own. Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.
Russia Today
02-07-2025
- Politics
- Russia Today
Aid as ambush: The horrifying new face of Israel's Gaza war
For nearly 630 days, the world has watched the Israeli slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza, primarily by bombing, sniping, and starvation. Off-camera, we've read about the rape and torture of Palestinian hostages, including the torturing to death of three doctors from the enclave. For the last 100 days, Israel has reinforced a full blockade on Gaza, depriving starving Palestinians of food, drinking water, medicines, and fuel – meaning ambulances cannot function. This is following prior blockades last year, and the overall blockade of the strip, which has lasted over 17 years. Since late May, we've been seeing horrific video footage of skeletal Palestinians lined up hoping for food aid being gunned down by US mercenaries and Israeli soldiers. Israel has endlessly bombed Palestinians, destroyed hospitals and abducted doctors and patients. It has bombed churches, schools, UN centres and tents housing displaced Palestinians – in supposed 'safe zones' where they were ordered by the Israeli army to flee to. It has killed over 200 journalists and deliberately targeted medics. To those only paying attention recently, these crimes go back decades, and extend to the Israeli army and illegal colonists' crimes against Palestinian civilians, including children, in the West Bank. Add to this the Israeli bombardment of civilian areas of Lebanon and Syria over the years, and now Israel's recent unprovoked bombings of Iran. Suffice it to say that when Israel came under the barrage of Iranian retaliatory missiles, reports of some 30 Israeli civilians suffering panic attacks garnered little sympathy. Again, those who have been paying attention for longer than two years would also recall previous Israeli wars on Gaza, like in 2014, when Israelis gathered with drinks and snacks on hillsides to rejoice in the bombing of the enclave, or the 2009 t-shirts celebrating snipers killing pregnant women with the phrase 'one shot, two kills'. In 2010, when writing about a traumatized 10 year old I'd met who could no longer walk normally nor speak after the terror of having Israeli tanks shelling his home, I cited a study by the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme which stated that '91.4 percent of children in Gaza displayed symptoms of moderate to very severe PTSD.'That was fifteen years and numerous Israeli wars on Gaza ago. The killing of Palestinians in Gaza didn't stop when Israel attacked Iran. The most insidious new invention is the recently-created US-Israeli 'aid' group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). The Israeli authorities accuse Hamas of stealing aid, and based on this unproven accusation, have deemed that long-established UN aid agencies could no longer operate in Gaza, insisting instead that a group staffed with armed combat veterans (mercenaries is a better word) is better equipped to ensure that food reaches famished Palestinians. It is outrageous that in spite of some media coverage, Israel has been allowed to for months (over a year, really) block the entrance of thousands of aid trucks amassed outside of Gaza, only to then dictate that hired gunmen would be in charge of 'distributing aid.' The massive irony and duplicity is that even Israeli and Western media have reported on the actual thieves of aid in Gaza: not Hamas, but an ISIS-linked group under the protection of the Israeli army. As the independent media outlet The Cradle reported, the group's leader, Yasser Abu Shabab, 'is a known leader of armed gangs linked to ISIS and involved in looting aid under Israeli protection... Multiple reports, including from Haaretz and The Washington Post, confirm that these gangs have been seen looting in full view of Israeli forces, who neither intervene nor prevent the theft.' In a subsequent post, The Cradle cited the Israeli Army Radio as reporting: 'Israel has transferred weapons to members of the militia operates mainly in the Rafah area, which the Israeli army has occupied and cleared. The militia's tasks include preventing humanitarian aid from entering Gaza and fighting Hamas.' What is apparently happening is that starved Palestinians, after walking many kilometres to the distribution sites, are then corralled into tight enclosures and fired upon by the 'aid' mercenaries. Jonathan Whittall, the Head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OCHA) described the situation as 'conditions created to kill, carnage, weaponized hunger, a death sentence for people just trying to survive.' In a clip posted on June 23, Whittall said, 'Israeli authorities are preventing us from distributing through these systems that we've established and that we know work. We could reach every family in Gaza, as we have in the past, but we're prevented from doing so at every turn.' More recently, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres echoed Whittall, saying: 'Any operation that channels desperate civilians into militarized zones is inherently unsafe. It is killing people.. People are being killed simply trying to feed themselves and their families. The search for food must never be a death sentence.' The UN's own humanitarian efforts are being 'strangled' by Israel, he said, and even the aid workers themselves are starving. The aid-seeking civilians are reportedly being shot in the head and chest, in what looks more like execution than 'warning shots' or 'crowd control'. The victims include an 18-month old girl whose X-ray shows a bullet lodged in her chest. According to Ramy Abdu, Chairman of the non-profit Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, the girl was shot while in her mother's arms on the way to a GHF aid point. As far back as last July, an article in The Lancet warning that the total number of Palestinian civilian deaths caused directly and indirectly by Israeli attacks since October 2023 could reach 'up to 186,000 or even more.'Other estimates were even more grim, include that of Norwegian Dr. Mads Gilbert, who has worked extensively from Gaza over the years, who said the number of those dead or soon to die could be over 500,000. Fast forward to a recent report by Yaakov Garb of Ben-Gurion University, published via the Harvard Dataverse. It describes the false aid distribution design as, 'all adjacent to Israeli military installations... manned by armed combat veterans backed by Israeli soldiers. The design creates a 'chokepoint' or 'fatal funnel' – a predictable movement path from a single entry to a single exit with no cover or concealment.' It is the graphic on page five which caught people's attention. From a population of 2.2 million before the genocide, the graph only accounts for 1.85 million, leaving many asking, where are the remaining 350,000 people? This makes the concerns voiced a year ago more valid. In his report, Yaakov Garb wrote, 'The Israeli military has an obligation, as the occupying power in Gaza, to supply the population with humanitarian relief... If an attacker cannot adequately and neutrally feed a starving population in the wake of a disaster it is ongoingly creating, it is obligated to allow other humanitarian agencies to do so.' But instead, every day we see new horrors of emaciated Palestinian civilians desperately braving death in hopes of securing food for their families... and being gunned down by the Israeli army and the mercenaries it backs. It seems, at least, that these actions are finally catching up with Israel, meaning a lack of support for or trust in the state or its representatives, and a global demand for justice for Palestinians. To cite Craig Mokhiber, a human rights lawyer and former senior UN Human Rights official, who posted recently on X: 'The (Israeli) regime is on trial for genocide. Its leaders are indicted for crimes against humanity. Israel is isolated. The regime is now almost universally despised, just as the Nazi and apartheid regimes were despised. People across the world stand overwhelmingly with Palestine. You don't come back from apartheid & genocide.'
The National
20-06-2025
- Health
- The National
The National reports from Israeli hospital hit by Iranian missile
Israel was hit on Thursday by what appears to be the largest wave of attacks since the war with Iran broke out, with a hospital suffering extensive damage. An Iranian missile unleashed destruction on the sprawling Soroka hospital complex in the southern Israeli city of Be'er Sheva. The National saw shattered glass, water dripping from burst pipes, mangled cars, and fallen cladding at the site. Medics said some urgent care is still being delivered but cannot say when operations will be back to normal. The Israeli military said search and rescue forces were working in 'several locations across the country'.
Irish Times
18-06-2025
- Health
- Irish Times
Israeli fire kills 30 in Gaza, medics say, as attention shifts to Iran
Israeli gunfire and strikes killed at least 30 people across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, local health authorities said, as some Palestinians there said their plight was being forgotten as attention shifted to the air war between Israel and Iran . The deaths included the latest in near daily killings of Palestinians seeking aid in the three weeks since Israel partially lifted a total blockade on Gaza that it had imposed for almost three months. Medics said separate airstrikes on homes in the Maghazi refugee camp and Zeitoun neighbourhood in central and northern Gaza killed at least 14 people, while five others were killed in an airstrike on a tent encampment in Khan Younis in southern Gaza. Eleven others were killed in Israeli fire at crowds of displaced Palestinians awaiting aid trucks brought in by the United Nations along the Salahuddin road in central Gaza, medics said. READ MORE The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it was looking into the reported deaths of people waiting for food. Regarding the other strikes, it said it was 'operating to dismantle Hamas military capabilities' and 'feasible precautions to mitigate civilian harm'. On Tuesday, Gaza's health ministry said 397 Palestinians among those trying to get food aid were killed and more than 3,000 were wounded since aid deliveries restarted in late May. Some in Gaza expressed concern that the latest escalations in the war between Israel and Hamas that began in October 2023 would be overlooked as the focus moved to Israel's five-day-old conflict with Iran. 'People are being slaughtered in Gaza, day and night, but attention has shifted to the Iran-Israel war. There is little news about Gaza these days,' said Adel, a resident of Gaza City. 'Whoever doesn't die from Israeli bombs dies from hunger. People risk their lives every day to get food, and they also get killed and their blood smears the sacks of flour they thought they had won,' he told Reuters via a chat app. Israel has been channelling much of the aid it is now allowing into Gaza through a new US and Israeli-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which operates a handful of distribution sites in areas guarded by Israeli forces. It has said it will continue to allow aid into Gaza, home to more than 2 million people, while ensuring aid does not get into the hands of Hamas. Hamas denies seizing aid, saying Israel uses hunger as a weapon against the population in Gaza. The Gaza war was triggered when Hamas-led militants attacked Israel in October 2023, killing 1,200 and taking about 250 hostages, according to Israeli allies. Israel's subsequent military assault on Gaza has killed nearly 55,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's health ministry, displaced almost all the territory's residents, and caused a severe hunger crisis. The assault has led to accusations of genocide and war crimes, which Israel denies. Palestinians in Gaza have been closely following Israel's air war with Iran, long a major supporter of Hamas. 'We are maybe happy to see Israel suffer from Iranian rockets, but at the end of the day, one more day in this war costs the lives of tens of innocent people,' said 47-year-old Shaban Abed, a father of five from northern Gaza. 'We just hope that a comprehensive solution could be reached to end the war in Gaza, too. We are being forgotten,' he said. —Reuters
Reuters
18-06-2025
- Health
- Reuters
Israeli fire kills 30 in Gaza, medics say, as attention shifts to Iran
CAIRO, June 18 (Reuters) - Israeli gunfire and strikes killed at least 30 people across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, local health authorities said, as some Palestinians there said their plight was being forgotten as attention shifted to the air war between Israel and Iran. The deaths included the latest in near daily killings of Palestinians seeking aid in the three weeks since Israel partially lifted a total blockade on Gaza that it had imposed for almost three months. Medics said separate airstrikes on homes in the Maghazi refugee camp and Zeitoun neighbourhood in central and northern Gaza killed at least 14 people, while five others were killed in an airstrike on a tent encampment in Khan Younis in southern Gaza. Eleven others were killed in Israeli fire at crowds of displaced Palestinians awaiting aid trucks brought in by the United Nations along the Salahuddin road in central Gaza, medics said. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it was looking into the reported deaths of people waiting for food. Regarding the other strikes, it said it was "operating to dismantle Hamas military capabilities" and "feasible precautions to mitigate civilian harm." On Tuesday, Gaza's health ministry said 397 Palestinians among those trying to get food aid had been killed and more than 3,000 wounded since aid deliveries restarted in late May. Some in Gaza expressed concern that the latest escalations in the war between Israel and Hamas that began in October 2023 would be overlooked as the focus moved to Israel's five-day-old conflict with Iran. "People are being slaughtered in Gaza, day and night, but attention has shifted to the Iran-Israel war. There is little news about Gaza these days," said Adel, a resident of Gaza City. "Whoever doesn't die from Israeli bombs dies from hunger. People risk their lives every day to get food, and they also get killed and their blood smears the sacks of flour they thought they had won," he told Reuters via a chat app. Israel has been channelling much of the aid it is now allowing into Gaza through a new U.S.- and Israeli-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which operates a handful of distribution sites in areas guarded by Israeli forces. It has said it will continue to allow aid into Gaza, home to more than 2 million people, while ensuring aid doesn't get into the hands of Hamas. Hamas denies seizing aid, saying Israel uses hunger as a weapon against the population in Gaza. The Gaza war was triggered when Hamas-led militants attacked Israel in October 2023, killing 1,200 and taking about 250 hostages, according to Israeli allies. U.S. ally Israel's subsequent military assault on Gaza has killed nearly 55,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's health ministry, displaced almost all the territory's residents, and caused a severe hunger crisis. The assault has led to accusations of genocide and war crimes, which Israel denies. Palestinians in Gaza have been closely following Israel's air war with Iran, long a major supporter of Hamas. "We are maybe happy to see Israel suffer from Iranian rockets, but at the end of the day, one more day in this war costs the lives of tens of innocent people," said 47-year-old Shaban Abed, a father of five from northern Gaza. "We just hope that a comprehensive solution could be reached to end the war in Gaza, too. We are being forgotten," he said.
