DaysofPal – From her hospital bed in Khan Younis, Baraa Abu Zaid counts the days, not in hope of recovery, but in fear that her turn for evacuation will never come.
Once a mother of three, Abu Zaid fled her home in Rafah, southern Gaza, when Israel launched its ground invasion there in mid-2024. Soon after, her family’s tent in Khan Younis was struck by a drone. Two of her children were killed instantly; she and her eldest son, 13-year-old Obaida, were critically wounded.
“We were taken to the hospital for treatment, but the dire health conditions, the lack of basic medicines and treatments, and the collapse of the health system prevented us from receiving proper care,” she told Middle East Eye.
Doctors at the overwhelmed hospital said both needed urgent surgery abroad. But Gaza’s last lifeline, the Rafah crossing with Egypt, had been sealed by Israel’s army. The medical transfer requests prepared by the health ministry became meaningless paperwork. Within two weeks, Obaida succumbed to his wounds.
“I feel every day that my end is near,” Abu Zaid said. “My name is on the travel list for treatment abroad, but I fear I don’t have enough time left to wait.”
Confined to her bed at Nasser Hospital, she endures fever, infection, and untreated wounds, the slow unraveling of a body abandoned by the world.
A Destroyed System
Abu Zaid’s story is one of thousands in Gaza’s deepening medical catastrophe.
Since Israel launched its two-year genocidal war in October 2023, Gaza’s health system has faced deliberate and systematic attacks, hospitals bombed and raided, doctors and nurses killed or detained, and ambulances targeted.
Only a handful of medical facilities remain partially functional, offering the barest minimum of care amid chronic shortages of fuel, electricity, and medical supplies.
The relentless bombardment has left hundreds dead or wounded each day, overwhelming what remains of Gaza’s health network. In two years, Israel has killed nearly 70,000 Palestinians and injured more than 170,000, according to Gaza’s health authorities.
More than 7,600 wounded were evacuated for treatment abroad through the Rafah crossing before Israel’s 2024 invasion of Rafah sealed the border entirely. Since then, Gaza has been cut off from the outside world, and from medical hope.
The Government Media Office in Gaza reports that over 9,300 wounded and sick Palestinians have died since October 2023 due to the collapse of medical care and Israel’s ongoing ban on medical evacuations.
Among those who died waiting for care was 19-year-old Omar Abu Qasem. His family’s home in central Gaza was bombed, moderately wounding his father and leaving Omar with severe burns and multiple injuries.
“He could not receive the necessary treatment due to the collapsing medical situation and the overwhelming number of wounded arriving at hospitals,” his brother Rajab said. “His condition kept worsening, and he died after about two weeks of pain and waiting.”
22,000 Await Evacuation
An estimated 22,000 people remain on waiting lists for urgent medical evacuation, according to Gaza’s media office.
Spokesperson Ismail al-Thawabteh described the continued blockade as “a deliberate crime aimed at perpetuating civilian suffering,” accusing Israel of using “human pain as a political bargaining chip.”
“Preventing the wounded and sick from obtaining their right to treatment abroad is a threat to their lives,” he said. “It aggravates their suffering and signals a grave danger looming over the already dire humanitarian situation.”
The World Health Organization estimates that around 16,500 people need immediate evacuation, including some 4,000 children.
Among them is nine-year-old Kinan Abu Mohsen, who has a piece of shrapnel lodged in his head. His mother says his condition is stable for now, but his life is at serious risk without surgery abroad.
“The shrapnel must be removed before it causes paralysis. I spend nights by his side, crying over his health,” she said.
What remains in Gaza’s hospitals is not healing but survival, a waiting room between life and death.
For patients like Baraa Abu Zaid, the sealed crossing has become both a physical and symbolic prison. Every day that Rafah stays closed, more names are crossed off the evacuation list, not because they left, but because they died waiting.
“All I want is a chance to live,” she said softly. “But here, even that has become impossible.”
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