Dr. Samer Attar: Most people died. I mean, some days the most you could do is just hold people’s hand and look them in the eyes, and watch them die. Either because they were malnourished, they were starving, or we had no blood to give them. Every day it felt like that. Every day in the North felt like that. And the directors there only got a chance to breathe once a shipment of fuel and medicine and food came in. And that was always a, that was always a Hail Mary. That was always, always felt like it was last minute. And now that it’s, now that it’s really cut off and they’re not getting supplies in, they’re not getting fuel and they’re not getting medicines and they’re not getting food in, now they’re really desperate. Because before, people would arrive last minute, they would arrive before the point of norm return. And now that seems to be happening.
Interviewer: And can you talk specifically about the children in these hospitals, the number of children who are died, who are maimed, who’ve had amputations? Well over a thousand now are alive, but amputated. The situation there. And this latest situation where one of the hospitals was a site of what was supposed to be a vaccination program, today.
Dr. Samer Attar: Yeah, that’s, I mean, you leave all in behind. That’s the hard part. You hate to see anyone suffer or die. But when you’re just seeing innocent kids, it’s not just the physical wounds, too. I remember one little girl, she was caught in an air strike and she was buried alive for 12 hours next to her dead parents. And then she got dug out and we had to perform emergency surgery on her leg. There’s another little girl, five years old. She came in with both legs just mangled after an explosion. And her mom was begging us not to amputate her legs. And we both knew, we both knew her legs weren’t going to make it. But I mean, those are the conversations we have to have. And I remember another seven-year-old girl came in with her arm just missing. Her arm was just, was blown off. And the surgeon across from me just, a very stoic, unemotional, strong, resilient surgeon just broke down in tears. He had it, after six months. Just couldn’t take it anymore. So that toll is very exacting. I mean, the physical wounds you can get to heal. You can get an amputation wound to heal. But it’s the psychic scars of seeing your parents buried alive. Or you’re buried alive and they’re dead. And you’re looking at them. Everyone in Gaza, every bed you go to, has a horrifying story of loss. Of losing a home, losing a loved one, losing a limb, losing an eye. And it never ends. And it just, every day you wake up to more and more of it. And that’s just what makes it so horrifying.