John Sparks: This is a dangerous place to be a doctor. The European hospital is the only facility still functioning, east of Rafah, with an Israeli military operation perilously close to its doors. A few days earlier, three British medics began a placement here and we managed to speak to one, an orthopedic surgeon called Mohammed Tahir. Tell me a bit about what the last couple of days have been like.
Mohammed Tahir: From the moment I arrived, I have been flooded with patients with various injuries, mainly complex injuries. But in the last few days, with the intensifying of the bombing in Rafah, we are getting just many blast injuries here. People literally, their limbs and their bodies torn to shreds. Children with mutilated faces, eviscerated eyes, kids whose limbs we’ve had to amputate because of the complexity of their injuries.
John Sparks: When did you arrive? What date did you enter Gaza?
Mohammed Tahir: I’ll be honest with you, right now, the day of the week has all evaporated. I work from morning till night every day, sometimes I finish at 4 a.m. So I’ve lost track of time. I can’t even remember what day I arrived. Circa one and a half weeks ago. I just keep operating. I don’t stop for lunch, I don’t stop for dinner. I think I’ve lost a significant amount of weight already. That’s sort of echoed by all the Palestinian and Gazans that I meet. Who to tell me – before the war, I used to be 80 kilos. Now I’m 60 kilos.
John Sparks: This is quite a moment in this conflict that you have arrived at.
Mohammed Tahir: I’ll be honest with you. Before coming here, I was warned by several friends – do not go now, because the Rafah of invasion is imminent and you are going a very dangerous time. I was anxious. I was a little bit scared to come. But then I thought to myself, if not me, then who?
John Sparks: Dr Tahir hasn’t worked in a war zone before. It’s his first time. We see him here after he amputated the legs of a husband and his wife. But he couldn’t save them. Their children perished at the scene of the blast. But this is the reality of his new existence. He’s treated 150 patients in the past 10 days.
Mohammed Tahir: I think it was either an air strike in which the parents were killed. They were two small children, one of whom we tried to resuscitate. But he was covered in burns from head to toe. We called it. He died. His sister, by the side, was also covered in wounds. Massive wound to her forehead where her skull was exposed and she had a skull fracture too. I’m there looking at these two children, wondering what did they do?
John Sparks: Can you describe the hospital for me? Just take me for a walk through the corridors.
Mohammed Tahir: This is a refugee camp. It is a hospital within a refugee camp. You have people, children, women sleeping on floors, and corridors, on stairs even with makeshift tents inside, tents outside too. There are a lot of families here looking for shelter because they know outside of the perimeter of this hospital they can be killed. When they see us, as people from foreign missions, they feel that we are in effect human shields for them against Israeli air strikes. Because we are their protection. And when they hear that we have to be evacuated or that there is a whisper, the entire population in the hospital are gripped with fear and panic that they are about to die.
John Sparks: The Israelis say that their operation in southern Gaza is limited. It’s precise. It’s a counterterrorism operation.
Mohammed Tahir: What I see on the floor in real life is very different to that.
John Sparks: The Rafah Crossing, which is the main humanitarian corridor in and out of Gaza, is shut. It’s closed. Which means that you can’t leave. Not at the moment anyway. I’m wondering how you feel about that.
Mohammed Tahir: I feel for my family. Not for myself. I know that they are terrified. I know that my friends and family are really concerned for my well-being. And I think it hurts them more than it hurts me. But the intensity of the feeling that I have because of the tragedies that I’m seeing, because of the suffering I’m seeing, I just feel like it cannot stop. I have to keep going and going and going and going. There is no time to rest. There is no time to sleep. I don’t have that luxury right now.
John Sparks: It’s a calling and a commitment and it will be tested. John Sparks, Sky News in Jerusalem.