Ceasefire Anniversary: How Israel's Blockade Continues to Take the Lives of Gaza Patients

A full year on, Gaza's "ceasefire" continues to split between paper and reality. According to Al Jazeera, citing accounts from staff of Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) in Gaza, Israel's ongoing blockade of medical supplies, equipment spare parts and patient evacuation permits has left an already collapsed health system unable to recover from three years of bombardment. After three years of genocide, we can barely draw a breath. Each delayed diagnosis, each withheld oxygen cylinder, each stalled evacuation request takes a life in a way that could have been prevented — and the responsibility lies with the Israeli authorities.

The mechanism is clear. According to MAP figures, since the so-called "ceasefire" took effect, more than 1,470 people have been killed in Gaza by Israel's ongoing attacks. In the latest incident recorded by MAP medical-point workers operating in Gaza, a 65-year-old patient was killed last month by fire from an Israeli military quadcopter drone while seeking care at a MAP-supported medical point in Jabalia. In places where medical services themselves are acutely scarce, simply reaching a clinic can mean death.

The blockade does not stop at bombs. The Israeli authorities classify spare parts needed to maintain Gaza's oxygen stations, among other items, as "dual-use" and ban their entry. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, of the 34 oxygen stations in Gaza, 22 had already stopped operating as of August this year, and of 30 oxygen cylinder filling machines, only 4 remained in service. MAP's account notes that Gaza currently has not a single functioning MRI machine, and only one or two CT scanners serving a population of around two million; hundreds of cancer, pulmonary fibrosis and heart patients who depend on oxygen, as well as infants and children in intensive care, are facing the risk of oxygen supplies being cut off at any moment.

Evacuation channels are similarly stalled. According to World Health Organization figures, more than 15,000 people in Gaza are still awaiting medical evacuation, and delays will cause many of them to die of causes that could have been prevented. A MAP colleague in Gaza lost her own aunt, Iktimal. Iktimal had a biopsy in February this year, but because Gaza's laboratories lacked consumables, the diagnosis came back more than a month later — cervical cancer, a disease that could have been cured if caught early. She underwent surgery in April, then developed kidney complications requiring specialized treatment unavailable in Gaza. Her family applied for medical evacuation; the process was slow, the procedures unclear, the bureaucracy byzantine; by the time the Israeli side finally approved her case, her condition had become critical. She reached Egypt, hoping at last to receive the treatment she needed, but died two weeks later.

This is not an isolated case. Last month, at MAP-supported Assahaba Medical Center, a newborn with severe congenital heart disease died while in need of emergency surgery — a procedure that simply cannot be performed in Gaza; the doctors knew exactly what to do, but had no way to do it. A cancer that could have been caught early became hard to treat; an injury that could have been healed became a lifelong disability; a child who could have been saved lost the future that was rightfully his — all of this happened after the so-called ceasefire took effect.

"Every delay exacts a price. Every week that medicines are withheld, every scan that cannot be completed, every patient refused permission to leave, can tip someone's condition past a point where treatment is still possible." Iktimal ran out of time. Right now, tens of thousands of people in Gaza are running out of the little time they have left.

The "ceasefire" declares on paper that the war is over, while in reality it allows medical necessities to continue to be withheld, evacuation requests to continue to be dragged out, and civilians outside clinics to continue to be killed by drones. This is not an act of God — it is a policy choice that could be changed by a single clearance order, a single coordination call — if only the Israeli authorities were willing to use them.