Basboy’s Weblog

I have been very much saddened ever since I heard about the outright massacre taking place in Gaza. I am not often one to check in on the the news during the weekend, as I prefer to decompress, reconnect with family and watch a movie or two. Yesterday was the second day of the Boxing “week” sales, and I had gone shopping despite my knowledge that all the true deals will have disappeared and that I will scarcely be able to breathe with all the masses partaking in the same commercial orgy that I am. I did not expect to come back in the afternoon and see the online world abuzz with the disaster in that smallest of Palestinian territories. I say disaster, because it has gotten so that Israel is so unaccountable for their crimes and unrepentant, that they might as well be a lifeless natural disaster, like a tornado that is uncompromising and unflinching in face of human turmoil.

I have to say that I will not offer any links to the ongoing killings, save to say that I am continually checking cnn.com and english.aljazeera.net, and watching the various news channels. I am not going to present any balanced and researched discourse of the situation in Gaza, and the socio-political ramification on both sides. My intention with this really short post was just to register my feelings, useless and inconsequential though they might be.

As many know, I worked for a short time in a hospital in Jerusalem. I have seen first-hand the casualties that are inflicted on our most innocent by the Israeli’s attacks on Gaza. This was before the seige placed on them consequent to Hamas taking it over- after having justly won the election, no less, but I digress. There was once a young and incredibly brave boy, no more than 10 years of age, who was transferred to our adult ICU because he was too old for the over-crowded PICU, and his injuries, resultant from a missle attack close to his home that killed his friend and stripped his skin along his entire left side, meant that he would not be served by the regular pediatric unit. So, he was registered under an older sibling’s name and age, and moved to our ICU because we had the room and the proper monitoring and increased care schedule to care for him. This was at the beginning of my work in 2005 in this unit, and I was unprepared for the reality of the situation in Gaza there. I learned that, even then, there was a very strict checkpoint in place there that only allowed certain crossing papers and passports to enter the rest of Israel, and only after enduring long wait times and many questions. A serious medical case like this for which their hospitals are unprepared (and lets be honest, their supplies are generally pathetic) had to go through many different channels, and only when they proved that there is a true need and that the child and his incredibly benign old father posed no threat were they allowed entry.

This boy was the definition of brave. He hardly winced at his injuries, and sometime cried quietly when dressings were changed on his wounds, as well as after having the painful skin grafts. Conversely, he had much difficulty with his physiotherapy, and I always tried to be the one taking care of him when it came to suctioning and any peripheral therapies, as he was resistant and fairly vocal- and I didn’t think the tough-love approach of my co-workers with him was warrated or helpful. They had seen it all, and had their approach to it all become very jaded. I saw a true representative of Gazan emotional trauma- a child who will take the hurt and physical pain as a given, but cry and fight with those that try to help him as they know best. I felt, and you only have my view here, that I was helpful in educating him as to his necessary therapies and being patient while he grumbled about the little things.  If I didn’t help him, it is because after all that, he had to return to that hopeless place and be subjected to more injustices than an educated global population should allow- but I was enriched, just the same, by his presence in my life, and by his father’s patience and true piety in the face of the most difficult hardship.

This is who I thought of when I saw the news yesterday, and I was immediately depressed because of this. I also thought of my many co-workers- the ICU nurse who looks like Doraid La7am who always supported me in my work and was patient with my mistakes; the genetic researcher and labratory chief who gave me shelter in his tiny apartment in the West Bank when I had nowhere to go; the various emergency room residents, nurses, or student nurses who could barely focus on the task at hand knowing that they have family that they might not see for whatever reason at any time. All of these have had much difficulty going back to see their closest loved ones, and have lost much money and time ensuring that they are able to continue having a job and support themselves and their families. I knew nothing of their suffering, and I now think of them and hope that they are well- but fear the worst.

I can do nothing but spread the word and show the world that I, like many worldly and educated people, am outraged by this massacre. I hope that it will make a difference.