The stories of three people who desperately need to leave Gaza for treatment, and the dark future they are staring at as a result of Israel’s actions.
Deir el-Balah, Gaza – Sadeel Hamdan was just about six weeks old when Israel launched its relentless war on Gaza.
Now she lies silently on a paediatric hospital bed in Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital – weak, intubated, her belly swollen and skin jaundiced.
Three months ago, doctors managed to get her name on a list of patients who badly needed to leave Gaza for treatment overseas.
But then, just days before she was to be evacuated, Israel invaded Rafah and closed the only crossing available for the sick to leave the besieged enclave, trapping Sadeel and many others.
Abdul Majeed al-Sabakhi, 20, lives on an oxygen respirator in the hospital.
Speaking is a struggle for the youth who has had cystic fibrosis since childhood.
In the first month of Israel’s war on Gaza, the Israeli army bombed the house next door to the al-Sabakhis’ home in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza. The impact destroyed their home as well.
“That day, I was pulled out of under the rubble, nearly suffocated by the toxic smoke and dust,” he recalls.
“But after the war … I became unable to do anything.”
Displaced with his parents, four brothers and two sisters to Rafah and then Deir el-Balah, he suffered in the tent and eventually had to be taken to hospital to stay on oxygen.
Abdul Majeed was supposed to travel, accompanied by his 21-year-old brother Osama, for urgent lung surgery, but then came news of the Rafah crossing being closed.
“Closing the crossing is a death sentence for me and many patients like me,” Abdul Majeed says, gasping for breath as the effort of speaking shakes his frail body.
“Every day I am delayed, my chance of survival decreases.
Abdul Majeed, struggling to breathe
“I’ve lost so much weight because my weak lungs mean I can’t even eat.”
Osama stays with Abdul Majeed in the hospital, day and night.
Ahed Abu Holi nearly lost her leg when the roof of their home collapsed on top of her family when Israel bombed it two months ago.
Her leg was in terrible shape, tissues and bones badly damaged. After five reconstructive surgeries, all of which have been unsuccessful, her doctors said they could do little else to help her and recommended that she see specialists overseas.
Otherwise, she was told, the only solution available to them would be to amputate her leg.
Now, the 25-year-old mother cannot move, spending her days in a hospital bed with her leg heavily bandaged and bolted.
Her two-year-old son is being looked after by her family, but she cannot see him because she worries that he could catch something in the hospital.
Her husband and sister take turns staying with her there, ducking out to fetch necessities, as her husband has done, leaving her for a short period to find some food for them.
“Two days before my travel date, the crossing was closed … and it doesn’t look like it’ll reopen,” Ahed says.
“I had really hoped I’d be able to travel. I waited so long and suffered so much. For two months, my life has been at a standstill.
“I can’t see or care for my only child. I’m in agony every day when they change the dressing on my wound.”
The wounds on Ahed’s leg have not healed, a common complication in Gaza now, where the population is extremely malnourished, their bodies too weak to recover.
Depending on how her condition progresses, doctors say they may have to amputate because there will be no other way to save Ahed.
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