In a scene that summarizes the suffering of the health sector in Gaza, Palestinian children at Al -Rantisi Children’s Hospital struggle to survive, as they undergo dialysis sessions amid harsh conditions and severe lack of medical capabilities, as a result of the continuous Israeli siege and the effect of extermination in the sector.
Inside the dialysis room, children lying on the family connected to the blood pumping devices that pull toxins from their mysterious bodies.
Their features are pale, and their eyes are awaiting, some of them closed the eyes from the severity of exhaustion, while others try to speak despite fatigue.
Near the baby’s bed, one of the mothers sits with his small hand, whispering with supplication in an attempt to calm her troubled heart, while the nurse presses the device buttons to start the process that takes 4 hours.
In a second angle, another child looks at the ceiling with two eyes, as if his age exceeded his few years, from the intensity of the pain and suffering he lives in in this hospital, which has become a permanent place for the battle for survival.
The only section north of Gaza
This department is at the Al -Rantisi Hospital in Gaza City, the only one to provide kidney dialysis services under 14 years in the northern Gaza Strip, according to Nabil Eid, head of the hospital’s kidney disease department.
Before October 7, 2023, the section included 14 dialysis machines, and served 45 children who needed the sessions 3 times a week.
But with a partial destruction of the department during the genocide, the service stopped temporarily, which resulted in the death of many children due to the lack of medical sessions and the necessary capabilities, as well as the difficulty of transporting patients to other places due to Israeli incursions and continuous bombing.
Recently opened
Despite the destruction, and thanks to the continuous efforts of the Ministry of Health, the department was recently reopened to start absorbing sick children who need this vital care.
Doctor Eid indicated that the department currently receives only 12 children, while some children who were receiving treatment before the Israeli war were transferred abroad to reduce health risks.
The department faces a severe decrease in basic medical supplies, especially children’s blood catheters, which are necessary to conduct dialysis sessions.
The hospital also suffers from a severe decrease in the necessary medicines and medical materials, which increases the suffering of children and their families.
He called on the Day of International Health Institutions to provide urgent support to the health system in the Gaza Strip, to help it overcome this continuous ordeal.
Since October 7, 2023, Israel has destroyed 34 out of 38 hospitals, including governmental and private, leaving only 4 hospitals working with a limited ability despite their damage, amid a severe shortage of medicines and medical equipment, according to the latest statistic of the government media office in Gaza.
The Israeli raids also removed 80 health centers from service completely, as well as the destruction of 162 other medical institutions.
An ongoing siege
In turn, the head of the government media office in Gaza Salama Maarouf said: The crime of the occupation continues by besieging the Gaza Strip and preventing the arrival of aid of all kinds, including fuel.
He added – in a recently published X platform – that this siege entails the stopping of hospitals and health centers completely, threatening the lives of thousands of patients and wounded.
He also pointed out that this situation causes municipal services, ambulance and civil defense, in addition to disrupting sanitation treatment plants, which increases the exacerbation of the humanitarian crisis in the sector.
On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that his government decided on Saturday to stop entering goods and supplies to the Gaza Strip.
Netanyahu addressed Hamas by saying that if you do not release the Israeli prisoners, the consequences will be unimaginable, announcing the preparation with the support of the American President Donald Trump, for the following stages of the battle.
In early March, the first stage of the ceasefire agreement in Gaza officially, which lasted 42 days, ended, while Israel dismissed the second stage and ended the war.
Netanyahu wants to extend the first phase of the exchange deal to release the largest possible number of Israeli prisoners in Gaza, without providing any compensation for that or completing the military and humanitarian benefits imposed on the agreement during the last period, in order to satisfy the extremists in his government.
Hamas repeatedly affirms its commitment to implement the ceasefire agreement, and demands that Israel be obligated to what it stipulated, and invites brokers to start immediately the negotiations of the second stage, including the Israeli withdrawal from the Strip and completely stopping the war.
With American support, Israel committed between October 7, 2023 and January 19, 2025, a group extermination in Gaza that left more than 160,000 martyrs and wounded Palestinians, most of them children and women, and more than 14,000 missing.