An American doctor who refused to evacuate from southern Gaza said on Friday that he remained in solidarity with his colleagues who were unable to leave, calling on US President Joe Biden to help ensure the safety of medical workers who treat patients affected by the war.
Washington Post correspondent Kim Bellower wrote a report about a doctor named Adam Hamwi and his fellow volunteers trapped in Gaza after Israeli forces seized the Rafah border crossing earlier this month.
Hamwi (53 years old), a former war trauma surgeon in the US Army, said in a statement to the Washington Post: “Never in my professional life have I witnessed the level of atrocities and targeting of my medical colleagues as I witnessed in Gaza.”
They are not safe
Hamwi added in his statement that he wants Biden to know that doctors are not safe, and that as a doctor, he cannot abandon the rest of his team, and as a former soldier, he cannot abandon his fellow Americans.
Hamwi had traveled to the Gaza Strip with the Virginia-based Palestinian American Medical Society, a mission coordinated by the World Health Organization, and his team of 19 people, including American citizens and citizens of other countries, arrived in the region through the Rafah border crossing on May 1. This is ongoing to support the European Hospital in Khan Yunis, near Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.
Hamwi and his colleagues – who arrived carrying bags full of supplies including much-needed anesthetics – were scheduled to leave Gaza on May 13, but shortly after their arrival, Israeli forces launched an operation in Rafah to seize the border crossing with Egypt. The borders were closed and doctors were trapped.
Hamwi said they were concerned that the European Hospital would suffer a similar fate to Al-Shifa and Nasser Hospital, referring to the two largest hospitals in Gaza that were destroyed by Israeli military raids.
Americans only
It is noteworthy that Hamwi is one of 3 American medical volunteers who remained in Gaza, while other colleagues were evacuated through the Kerem Shalom crossing, with the help of the American embassy in Jerusalem. Only American citizens were given permission to leave.
Hamwi said in a text message early Saturday that 11 team members from other countries, as well as two permanent U.S. residents, were not offered an exit.
He explained that when he got the call to evacuate, he was asked to choose between evacuating and leaving his team behind or staying with the team. He said in his statement that his conscience did not allow him to leave his team behind, and he continued, “This was not what I was taught. This is not the soldiers’ doctrine. We do not leave Americans behind. This is against our values as Americans.”
Hamwi, who lives in New Jersey, was among the doctors whom Sen. Tammy Duckworth publicly credited with saving her life in Iraq in 2004.
Another group
The Palestinian American Medical Society has another group of volunteers waiting in Egypt to replace Hamwi’s team, but Israel has severely restricted the entry of foreign aid workers into Gaza since it closed the Rafah border.
Hamwi and his colleagues do not know when they might have the opportunity to leave, and in his statement, he apologized to his family for not returning, saying: “I know it is painful that I will not return home this weekend, and I am sorry, but I know that you are proud that I am adhering to my oath not to leave.” “No one is ever behind me.”
In a letter to the Washington Post, Hamwi said, “If all American citizens leave, what does this mean for us as a country? We are not like that.”
