Doctor speaks about visit to Gaza, says Israeli embargo must be lifted
Dr. Ismail Mehr said relaxing the Gaza border’s embargo for humanitarian teams is a priority during his March 13 lecture.
Mehr is one of 10 physicians who visited Gaza on a humanitarian medical mission in January. He is the head of anesthesiology at St. James Mercy Hospital in Hornell, N.Y. The Muslim Student Association’s UTA chapter organized the lecture.
“It took us about seven days to get in,” he said. “The borders, on both Israeli and Palestinian side, were not open even to humanitarian teams.”
Mehr offered a brief history of the conflict to help students understand the situation better.
“I had little knowledge about the Palestine-Israel conflict,” engineering junior Pranusha Ravula said. “But Dr. Mehr helped me understand the history well.”
Mehr helped at Gaza City’s Shiffa Hospital.
“There are 13 [government] hospitals in Gaza,” he said. “Two were completely destroyed and numerous were shot and attacked.”
Mehr said novocaine (local anaesthesia), chemotherapy and other medical tools were hard to get into Gaza because of the embargo.
“Nothing will be resolved until the blood of a Palestinian will be respected as much as that of an American,” he said.
Mehr told a story about a 5-year-old boy diagnosed with liver cancer who was denied exit to Israel or Egypt to get treatment.“
There is no chemotherapy in Gaza,” he said. “He would have had a better chance if this embargo allowed him to exit to get treatment.”
Mehr told stories of young children suffering because of lack of medical equipment in Gaza.
“In Gaza, medicine is improvisation,” he said. “This embargo has crippled and choked the medical system.”
A child who fell at home and cut his lip was held down by his mom and stitched, without pain relief, he said.
In Gaza, they don’t use novocaine on a child because there’s no telling how long it might take to get more due to the embargo, he said.
Mehr encouraged Americans to send more humanitarian teams to Gaza.
“Gaza is the largest open-air prison,” he said passionately. “The dilemma is that the rest of the world just sits there and watches.”
The team of 10 physicians visited an orphanage affected by the conflict.
“There were 3,000 new orphans due to this conflict,” he said. “There were some kids diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder because they saw their parents die.”
Mehr said it’s hard to achieve peace until the new settlements being built every year on the West Bank stop.
“The Palestinian people will stand up and be strong every day,” he said. “They are the most hospitable and the bravest people I have ever met.”
Mehr provided help after the 2004 tsunami and the earthquake in Pakistan in 2005.
“Tsunami and earthquake were acts of mother nature,” he said. “But with the Gaza situation, you cannot really answer the question why another person did this.”
Mehr asked students to read about the conflict and create awareness.
“History ends up being ‘his’ story,” he said. “It’s not political but if anyone had a human touch, they would stand up for these civilians.”
Mehr’s stories brought tears to some students’ eyes.
Biology junior Mohammed Ali said that he thought the presentation showed reality, and he wished other cultures had attended to increase awareness.
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CORRECTION: It actually took the AMMG team over one day to cross into Gaza, not seven.
