Palestinian cancer patients find treatments in Egypt no longer available in embattled Gaza

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​ A Palestinian cancer patient, who had crossed from Gaza into Egypt, disembarks the plane on a wheelchair after arriving at the Esenboga Airport in Ankara on November 16, 2023. (AFP) ​
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Updated 08 April 2024
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Palestinian cancer patients find treatments in Egypt no longer available in embattled Gaza

  • Destruction of infrastructure and shortages of medical supplies have compounded the misery of patients
  • Israel has ignored repeated calls to halt its offensive and appeals to let in sufficient humanitarian aid

ARISH, Egypt: Twenty-one Palestinian cancer patients who escaped Gaza in recent months are now housed in a residence named Building 30 in the city of Arish in Egypt’s northern Sinai. There they await treatments that are no longer available in their war-scarred enclave.

“We are living in a state of limbo,” Said, a retired educator in his 70s who has prostate cancer, told Arab News at the residence, where he has stayed with his daughter Shahed since leaving Gaza for the safety of Egypt.

“It’s been five months since I last received medical care. I have been here for two months and prior to that for three months there was no cancer medication left in Gaza and it was hard to leave to receive treatment in Ramallah and the West Bank.”




This infographic was published by the World Health Organization in October 2023, just 3 weeks after the war in Gaza began. 

The conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, which began on Oct. 7, has left thousands of Palestinian cancer patients unable to access diagnostics and potentially lifesaving treatments amid the destruction of infrastructure and shortages of medical supplies.

Early on in the conflict, the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital, the only facility in the Gaza Strip providing cancer treatments, was forced to suspend services owing to power outages and shortages of fuel for its generators.

About 10,000 cancer patients in Gaza have been unable to get treatment or medicines since the hospital shut down in the first week of November, according to Gaza’s health ministry.




Palestinians evacuated from the Gaza Strip who arrived on a plane from Egypt's El-Arish airport disembark upon landing in Abu Dhabi on November 27, 2023, as part of a humanitarian mission organized by the United Arab Emirates. (AFP/File)

As a result, Palestinian cancer patients are either forgoing treatment altogether or desperately appealing to aid agencies and authorities to help facilitate their evacuation abroad where they can access medicines and therapies.

For those who have found a way to escape Gaza to neighboring Egypt, their best chance of receiving treatment lies in the hands of officials of the UAE, Qatar and Turkiye, which have made good on their pledge to support Gazan cancer patients.

The war has made it even harder for Gazans to secure permits for medical transfer out of the enclave. Even before the conflict, about 20,000 cancer patients required permission to leave each year to receive the specialized care unavailable in Gaza.

Barred from traveling to Ramallah in the West Bank to continue his treatment, Said decided to cross into Egypt with Shahed in the hope of securing treatment there or perhaps further afield.




In this photo taken on February 1, 2021, Palestinian thyroid cancer patient Tahani al-Rifi takes her medicine at home in Gaza City. The destruction of hospitals and further restrictions imposed since the Israeli siege of Gaza has left thousands of cancer patients in the Palestinian enclave without medical care. (AFP/File)

But the stress of waiting for treatment has compounded the trauma of war and displacement, leaving Said weak and depressed. Shahed believes her father’s low mood is detrimental to his ailing health.

“I do what I can to keep his spirits up,” she told Arab News. “I have been working on trying to get him included with the patients that will be picked by the envoys. Medication of course matters but so does his mood. How can he beat the disease if he feels beaten himself?”

The battle to secure her father’s treatment has taken a toll on the whole family.

“It has been very difficult for us and we cannot afford to get him private treatment,” Shahed said. “We do not have the means for it anymore.”




In this handout photograph taken and released by Turkish Presidency Press Office on November 16, 2023, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (R) speaks with Palestinian cancer patients at Bilkent City Hospital in Ankara. (Handout via AFP)

While fighting to secure treatment, Said is also enduring the grief of having lost another of his daughters.

“Not only is my father sick but he is haunted by the death of my sister,” Shahed said.

“One day she had called to check in on him and to see if he was able to receive a permit to go to Ramallah for his chemotherapy during the war, and as she was on the phone with him a rocket hit her house.

“She was crushed under heavy debris. Her death tore us apart, especially my father. You can see it in his eyes, there’s no light there anymore. Tell me, what should I help him heal first, his cancer or her death?”




A Palestinian cancer patient, who had crossed from Gaza into Egypt, is carried on a stretcher after arriving at the Esenboga Airport in Ankara, Turkiye, on November 16, 2023. She was among the lucky ones who were able to get out of Gaza. (AFP/File)

Gazan cancer patients and their families felt abandoned, Shahed said.

“I know the medical needs for women and children and those injured are important, but it seems like we’ve been forgotten, overlooked. Elderly folk have a right to life too.”

Said’s cancer is at a risk of metastasizing and his missed treatment windows mean his condition has become life threatening.

“My body aches all the time,” he said. “And I just wait and wait. Lately, I have been having talks with Shahad about returning back to Gaza. I would rather die there and be with my deceased daughter than continue to wait and die slowly here. What else can I do?”

Israel has ignored repeated calls for an immediate ceasefire and appeals to allow sufficient humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip. It remains determined to eliminate Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups responsible for the Oct. 7 attack.

In the process, Gaza’s health infrastructure has been brought to the brink of collapse. According to the UN, less than a third of the territory’s hospitals remain partially functioning. Those still operating are overwhelmed by wounded civilians.




A Palestinian medic inspects damaged equipment in the dialysis unit at Gaza's devastated Al-Shifa hospital on April 3, 2024, two days after the Israeli military withdrew from the hospital complex. (AFP)

The Israeli government says its military does not target civilians or hospitals and blames Hamas for conducting military operations and launching rockets from crowded residential areas.

Nevertheless, for cancer patients, the loss of vital health infrastructure and options for travel have resulted in missed treatment windows, leading to the aggressive progression of the disease and death — outcomes that under regular circumstances could have been avoided.

Bassam, another resident of Building 30 who also has prostate cancer, said he felt like a “burning cigarette” — his lifespan gradually shrinking, reduced to ash, the longer he waits for treatment.

“I am wasting away here. It is a slow death,” he told Arab News.




Two men take an injured to the Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza City on March 27, 2024 amid the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas. (AFP)

And just like Said, Bassam is simultaneously coping with trauma brought on by the cruelties of war.

“My son is still in Gaza. He has kidney problems, which require dialysis three times a week. He was being treated before the war but now he’s lucky if he can manage to get dialysis twice a week.

“His brother is willing to give him a kidney, but even with that option there is no hospital able to perform the operation. Israeli forces have left no hospital functional. We’re on a slow death, my son and I. He awaits treatment in Gaza and I wait here.”

More than 70,000 Palestinians have been injured since the war began, according to the Gaza health ministry. To bolster Egypt’s capacity to accept and treat Palestinian evacuees, the World Health Organization has donated $1 million worth of medical supplies.




Infographic by ReliefWeb, a humanitarian information service of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

These include trauma kits, blood for transfusions, medical equipment, hygiene kits, anesthetics and various medicines. The French government has also unloaded 8 tonnes of medical equipment in Egypt for hospitals treating injured Gazans.

Several nations and NGOs have established makeshift hospitals on land and on boats, while Egypt has allocated 37 hospitals across eight of its governorates to treat Palestinian patients.

According to the Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population, about 15,000 Palestinians are receiving medical care in the country. However, Bassam said that even those facilities were overcrowded, leaving little room for those with chronic conditions like cancer.

“Hospitals are crowded with those injured,” he said. “You look at us and you don’t see a visible illness or injury, so you assume we’re okay or that our treatment can wait. But it cannot.

“I am happy for those receiving treatment, but we must not be forgotten just because our ailment isn’t visible.”


 


EU pressing Israel to improve Gaza humanitarian situation, top diplomat says

Updated 11 July 2025
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EU pressing Israel to improve Gaza humanitarian situation, top diplomat says

  • EU’s diplomatic service presented 10 options for political action against Israel after it found “indications” Israel breached human rights obligations under pact
  • Foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas says the options were prepared in response to member states that want stronger pressure on Israel to rectify suffering of civilians in Gaza

KUALA LUMPUR: The European Union is seeking ways to put pressure on Israel to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza, its top diplomat said, as member states weighed action against Israel over what they see as potential human rights violations.
The EU’s diplomatic service on Thursday presented 10 options for political action against Israel after saying it found “indications” last month that Israel breached human rights obligations under a pact governing its ties with the bloc.
In a document prepared for EU member countries and seen by Reuters, the options included major steps such as suspending the EU-Israel Association Agreement — which includes trade relations — and lesser steps such as suspending technical projects.
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on Friday the options were prepared in response to member states that wanted stronger pressure on Israel to rectify the suffering of civilians in Gaza’s now 21-month-old war.
“Our aim is not to punish Israel in any way,” she said after meeting with Asian foreign ministers in Kuala Lumpur on Friday, amid growing global jitters arising from US President Donald Trump’s tariff offensive.
“Our aim is to really improve the situation on the ground (in Gaza), because the humanitarian situation is untenable.”
EU members have voiced concern over the large number of civilian casualties and mass displacement of Gaza’s inhabitants during Israel’s war against Hamas militants in the enclave, and alarm about restrictions on access for humanitarian aid.
Kallas said on Thursday Israel had agreed to expand humanitarian access to Gaza, including increasing the number of aid trucks, crossing points and routes to distribution hubs.
She also said negotiations with the US on a trade deal to avoid high tariffs threatened by Trump were ongoing, and stressed that the EU did not want to retaliate with counter-levies on US imports.
Trump has said the EU could receive a letter on tariff rates by Friday, throwing into question the progress of talks between Washington and the bloc on a potential trade deal.
“We have of course possibilities to react, but we don’t want to retaliate. We don’t want a trade war, actually,” Kallas said.


Lebanese president rules out normalization with Israel

Updated 11 July 2025
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Lebanese president rules out normalization with Israel

  • Joseph Aoun calls on Israel to withdraw from the five points near the border it still occupies in southern Lebanon
  • He expressed hope for peaceful relations with Israel in the future

BEIRUT: Lebanese President Joseph Aoun ruled out normalization between his country and Israel on Friday, while expressing hope for peaceful relations with Beirut’s southern neighbor, which still occupies parts of southern Lebanon.
Aoun’s statement is the first official reaction to Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar’s statement last week in which he expressed his country’s interest in normalizing ties with Lebanon and Syria.
Aoun “distinguished between peace and normalization,” according to a statement shared by the presidency.
“Peace is the lack of a state of war, and this is what matters to us in Lebanon at the moment. As for the issue of normalization, it is not currently part of Lebanese foreign policy,” the president said in front of a delegation from an Arab think tank.
Lebanon and Syria have technically been in a state of war with Israel since 1948, with Damascus saying that talks of normalization were “premature.”
The president called on Israel to withdraw from the five points near the border it still occupies. Israel was required to fully withdraw from southern Lebanon under a November ceasefire seeking to end its war with Iran-backed Hezbollah.
Aoun said that Israeli troops in Lebanon “obstruct the complete deployment of the army up to the internationally recognized borders.”
According to the ceasefire agreement, Hezbollah must pull its fighters north of the Litani River, around 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the border with Israel, leaving the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers as the only armed parties in the area.
The United States has been calling on Lebanon to fully disarm Hezbollah, and Lebanese authorities sent their response to Washington’s demand this week.
The response was not made public, but Aoun stated that Beirut was determined to “hold the monopoly over weapons in the country.”
The implementation of this move “will take into account the interest of the state and its security stability to preserve civil peace on one hand, and national unity on the other,” hinting that Hezbollah’s disarmament will not be done through force.
Hezbollah, a powerful political force in Lebanon, is the only non-state actor to have officially retained its weaponry after the end of Lebanon’s 15-year civil war in 1990, as parts of southern Lebanon were still under Israeli occupation at the time.
The Lebanese group was heavily weakened following its year-long hostilities with Israel, which escalated into a two-month war in September.


UN reports nearly 800 deaths near Gaza aid hubs in six weeks

Updated 11 July 2025
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UN reports nearly 800 deaths near Gaza aid hubs in six weeks

  • Killings took place both at aid points run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and near humanitarian convoys run by other relief bodies
  • GHF says UN figures are 'false and misleading' and denies killings took place at its sites

GENEVA: The UN rights office said on Friday it had recorded at least 798 killings within the past six weeks at aid points in Gaza run by the US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and near convoys run by other relief groups.

The GHF uses private US security and logistics companies to get supplies into Gaza, largely bypassing a UN-led system that Israel alleges has let Hamas-led militants loot aid shipments intended for civilians. Hamas denies the allegation.

After the deaths of hundreds of Palestinian civilians trying to reach the GHF’s aid hubs in zones where Israeli forces operate, the United Nations has called its aid model “inherently unsafe” and a violation of humanitarian impartiality standards.

“(From May 27) up until the seventh of July, we’ve recorded 798 killings, including 615 in the vicinity of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation sites, and 183 presumably on the route of aid convoys,” UN rights office (OHCHR) spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani told a regular media briefing in Geneva.

The GHF, which began distributing food packages in Gaza at the end of May after Israel lifted an 11-week-old aid blockade, told Reuters on Friday the UN figures were “false and misleading.” It has repeatedly denied that deadly incidents have occurred at its sites.

“The fact is the most deadly attacks on aid sites have been linked to UN convoys,” a GHF spokesperson said.

The OHCHR said it bases its figures on a range of sources such as information from hospitals in the Gaza Strip, cemeteries, families, Palestinian health authorities, NGOs and its partners on the ground.

Most of the injuries to Palestinians in the vicinity of aid distribution hubs recorded by OHCHR since May 27 were gunshot wounds, Shamdasani said.

“We’ve raised concerns about atrocity crimes having been committed and the risk of further atrocity crimes being committed where people are lining up for essential supplies such as food,” she said.

Israel has repeatedly said its forces operate near the relief aid sites to prevent supplies falling into the hands of militants it has been fighting in the Gaza war triggered by the Hamas-led cross-border attack on October 7, 2023.

The GHF said on Friday it had delivered more than 70 million meals to hungry Gaza Palestinians in five weeks, and that other humanitarian groups had “nearly all of their aid looted” by Hamas or criminal gangs.The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has previously cited instances of violent pillaging of aid, while the UN World Food Programme said last week that most trucks carrying food assistance into Gaza had been intercepted by “hungry civilian communities.”

There is an acute shortage of food and other basic supplies 21 months into Israel’s military campaign in during which much of the enclave has been reduced to rubble and most of its 2.3 million inhabitants displaced.


Kurdish PKK militants burn weapons in Iraq to launch disarmament

Updated 20 min 9 sec ago
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Kurdish PKK militants burn weapons in Iraq to launch disarmament

  • Disarmament ceremony marks a turning point in the transition of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party from armed insurgency to democratic politics
  • Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan said peace efforts with the Kurds would gain momentum after the PKK begin laying down its weapons

SULAYMANIYAH, Iraq: Thirty Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants burned their weapons at the mouth of a cave in northern Iraq on Friday, marking a symbolic but significant step toward ending a decades-long insurgency against Turkiye.
Footage from the ceremony showed the fighters, half of them women, queuing to place AK-47 assault rifles, bandoliers and other guns into a large grey cauldron. Flames later engulfed the black gun shafts pointed to the sky, as Kurdish, Iraqi and Turkish officials watched nearby.
The PKK, locked in conflict with the Turkish state and outlawed since 1984, decided in May to disband, disarm and end its separatist struggle after a public call to do so from its long-imprisoned leader Abdullah Ocalan.
After a series of failed peace efforts, the new initiative could pave the way for Ankara to end an insurgency that has killed over 40,000 people, burdened the economy and wrought deep social and political divisions in Turkiye and the wider region.
President Tayyip Erdogan said he hoped the PKK’s dissolution would bolster Turkish security and regional stability. “May God grant us success in achieving our goals on this path we walk for the security of our country, the peace of our nation, and the establishment of lasting peace in our region,” he said on X.
Friday’s ceremony was held at the entrance of the Jasana cave in the town of Dukan, 60 km (37 miles) northwest of Sulaymaniyah in the Kurdistan region of Iraq’s north.
The fighters, in beige military fatigues, were flanked by four commanders including senior PKK figure Bese Hozat, who read a statement in Turkish declaring the group’s decision to disarm.
“We voluntarily destroy our weapons, in your presence, as a step of goodwill and determination,” she said, before another commander read the same statement in Kurdish.
Helicopters hovered overhead, with dozens of Iraqi Kurdish security forces surrounding the mountainous area, a Reuters witness said.
The ceremony was attended by Turkish and Iraqi intelligence figures, officials of Iraq’s Kurdistan regional government and senior members of Turkiye’s pro-Kurdish DEM party — which also played a key role this year facilitating the PKK’s disarmament decision.
It was unclear when further handovers would take place.
A senior Turkish official said the arms handover marked an “irreversible turning point” in the peace process, while another government source said ensuing steps would include the legal reintegration of PKK members into society in Turkiye and efforts to heal communities and promote reconciliation.

Next steps


The PKK has been based in northern Iraq after being pushed well beyond Turkiye’s southeastern frontier in recent years. Turkiye’s military carries out regular strikes on PKK bases in the region and established several military outposts there.
The end of NATO member Turkiye’s conflict with the PKK could have consequences across the region, including in neighboring Syria where the United States is allied with Syrian Kurdish forces that Ankara deems a PKK offshoot.
Washington and Ankara want those Kurds to quickly integrate with Syria’s security structure, which has been undergoing reconfiguration since the fall in December of autocratic President Bashar Assad. PKK disarmament could add to this pressure, analysts say.
The PKK, DEM and Ocalan have all called on Erdogan’s government to address Kurdish demands for more rights in regions where Kurds form a majority, particularly Turkiye’s southeast where the insurgency was concentrated.
In a rare online video published on Wednesday, Ocalan — whose large image was shown at the weapons ceremony — also urged Turkiye’s parliament to set up a commission to oversee disarmament and manage the broader peace process.
Ankara has taken steps toward forming the commission, while the DEM and Ocalan have said that legal assurances and certain mechanisms were needed to smooth the PKK’s transition into democratic politics.
Omer Celik, spokesman for Erdogan’s AK Party, said the ceremony marked a first step toward full disarmament and a “terror-free Turkiye,” adding this must be completed “in a short time.”
Erdogan has said the disarmament will enable the rebuilding of Turkiye’s southeast.
Turkiye spent nearly $1.8 trillion over the past five decades combating terrorism, Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek has said. 

 

 


Gaza civil defense says Israeli forces kill 18

Updated 58 min 39 sec ago
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Gaza civil defense says Israeli forces kill 18

  • At least 10 people shot by Israeli forces while waiting for supplies in the Al-Shakoush area northwest of Rafah, officials in Gaza say
  • Six more people killed in four separate Israeli air strikes in the area of Khan Yunis, in the south of the territory

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories: Gaza’s civil defense agency said Israeli forces killed 18 people on Friday, including 10 who were waiting for aid in the south of the war-ravaged territory.
The fresh deaths came as the United Nations said nearly 800 people had been killed trying to access food in Gaza since late May, when Israel began easing a more than two-month total blockade on supplies.
UN rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said most of the deaths occurred near facilities operated by the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
Gaza civil defense official Mohammed Al-Mughayyir said that 10 people were shot by Israeli forces on Friday while waiting for supplies in the Al-Shakoush area northwest of Rafah, where there are regular reports of deadly fire on aid seekers.
The civil defense reported six more people killed in four separate Israeli air strikes in the area of Khan Yunis, in the south of the territory.
Two drone strikes around Gaza City in the north killed two more people, civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.
There was no immediate comment on the latest strikes from the Israeli military, which has recently expanded its operations across Gaza.
Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defense agency and other parties.
A Palestinian speaking to AFP from southern Gaza on condition of anonymity reported ongoing attacks and widespread devastation, with Israeli tanks seen near Khan Yunis.
“The situation remains extremely difficult in the area — intense gunfire, intermittent air strikes, artillery shelling, and ongoing bulldozing and destruction of displacement camps and agricultural land to the south, west and north of Al-Maslakh,” an area to Khan Yunis’s south, said the witness.
Israel’s military said in a statement that its soldiers were operating in the area, dismantling “terrorist infrastructure sites, both above and below ground,” and seizing “weapons and military equipment.”
The civil defense also reported on Friday five people killed in an Israeli strike the previous night on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Jabalia Al-Nazla, in northern Gaza.
Nearly all of Gaza’s population has been displaced at least once during the more than 21-month war, which has created dire humanitarian conditions for the more than two million people living there.
Many have sought shelter in school buildings, but these have repeatedly come under Israeli attack, with the military often saying they were targeting Hamas militants hiding among civilians.