Translators' Introduction
We present here testimonies from doctors and international healthcare workers who volunteered in the Gaza Strip. With the outbreak of the war, most international parties were banned from entering the Gaza Strip. In particular, international journalists were completely banned from entering. In this reality, the only ones able to communicate to the world what is happening in Gaza are several dozen doctors and international healthcare workers with extensive experience in war zones – whose entry into the Strip was approved on a limited basis. Their testimonies constitute the nearly exclusive testimonies of international organizations and individuals from within the Strip throughout the war.
The international doctors and healthcare teams testify that the scale of harm to civilians in Gaza, the destruction of infrastructure, and the damage to humanitarian aid surpass anything they have witnessed in previous war zones. They testify that most of their patients were women and children, with the placement of their gunshot wounds often indicating deliberate targeting. They testify about shortages of medical equipment; about performing surgeries without minimal disinfection and anesthesia because Israel bans their entry; about the injury and killing of over a thousand healthcare workers; about hunger and chronic illness resulting from the lack of supplies and deplorable sanitation conditions. The medical and healthcare personnel whose testimonies we present here declare that they did not treat Hamas militants and did not encounter them in the hospitals.
The doctors and healthcare teams appeal to the leaders of their home countries and request: stop the war, ensure the entry of humanitarian aid, prevent the continued devastation of the Gaza healthcare system, and end the harm to civilians. They act in the name of the right to life and the right to health, and their frustration is deep because these universal values – enshrined in international law and reflected in world public opinion – are being violated. They cannot understand why the testimonies from Gaza – including their own – have failed to prompt decisive action from the international community and the leaders of their home countries.
It is critical for them to bear witness to the people they met in Gaza and to convey their cry to the world: “We are not a number, we have names and we are human beings, don’t abandon us.” They, as international volunteers, had the opportunity to leave the Gaza Strip and appear to testify at the UN and in elected assemblies around the world, but they recognize that Gaza residents should ideally be able to tell their own stories, and that Gaza residents’ testimonies in the media and social networks deserve to be heard by the world.
The testimonies included here were broadcast on various media channels and platforms around the world; some were presented in Israeli media (mainly in Haaretz newspaper and on the Sikha Mekomit website), but most of them did not reach the Israeli public. We believe it is important that these firsthand testimonies be published in Hebrew and made available to Israeli society, alongside the testimonies from Gaza Strip residents and local journalists who are still operating there. We hope that Israeli society will not be able to close its eyes and claim it did not know.
The testimonies were translated from English to Hebrew by us volunteers of the Bearing Witness project. In the English version of the site, we transcribed the filmed testimonies, and for written testimonies, we wrote summaries and provided links to the original source. While the collection of testimonies we have gathered is not complete and we will continue to add testimonies to it, we believe it is extensive and reading it contributes to understanding the situation in the Gaza Strip.
The testimonies are difficult to watch and read, and many of them include extremely harsh graphic descriptions. Nevertheless, we urge everyone who can to watch the testimonies. It is important in our view not only to read our translations, but also to listen to the original testimonies, to the tone, to the storm of emotions, to the caring and infinite concern of a group of people who left their comfortable lives, endangered themselves out of commitment to their mission to save lives and bear witness.
We recognize that our contribution – translating and collecting these testimonies – is extremely modest. The testimonies exist and can be viewed directly, even if not in Hebrew. However, in the very act of reading and translating the testimonies, we felt the duty and had the privilege to bear witness and pass it on. In this sense, our position as volunteers and translators is no different from yours, the readers of the testimony collected here. This is an invitation for you to bear witness with us. In our view, this is a way of resistance.
We had the privilege of working together on this testimony project. The activity allows us to act together as a community and to learn that although we are a minority, there are many others who share our path and are committed to resisting the situation in the Gaza Strip.
We believe in the importance of bringing the story of Ahmad, age 13, the last survivor of his family, who wants to die because everyone he loved is already in heaven – alongside the stories of many others.
They are all human beings, they all deserve to live.
- Testimony Project Team:
Llewelyn Barnes
Orit Schwartz
Evyatar Sella
Romy Paldi
Jessica Nevo
Ruth Benarie
M.O.
Anonymous volunteer
Abigail Hurwitz
Ori D. Gilad
Noam Yonai
Ilay S.
Y.E.L
Muhammad Toukhy
Alby Shlonsky
V.R
Lee Mordechai
Nina Kon
Tomer Oren
Lilach Assaf-Mølbach
Tali Bromberg
Gali Agnon
Avner Greenberg
Yoel Honovich
Eyal Sapir
L.z.