Censored BBC Documentary Exposes Israel's War On Gaza's Doctors.

A New Documentary Censored By The BBC Exposes Gaza's Systematic War On Gaza's Healthcare.

Recently, the documentary “Gaza: Doctors Under Attack,” which was prevented from being aired on the British state-funded media outlet BBC, was acquired by the British channel “Channel 4” and the independent news outlet Zeteo for release.

Having seen the documentary, it is not surprising that it was censored - it is a horrific and deeply disturbing investigation into Israel's systemic war on Gaza’s healthcare system, part of the wider genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

In this article, I will summarize some of the most shocking and disturbing revelations from the film.

Israel’s War On Gaza’s Hospitals.

The film- narrated by journalist Ramita Navai- begins with Navai noting that “Every one of Gaza’s 36 main hospitals has been attacked, forced to evacuate or destroyed, and Israel has been killing the very people trying to keep the healthcare system alive, it’s doctors and medics, despite healthcare workers being protected under international law”.

Pictured Above: Map from the documentary showcasing all of Gaza’s hospitals that have been destroyed by the IDF.

The film focuses on investigating specific cases, the Israeli attacks at Al Shifa hospital, the Indonesian hospital, Al Adwa Hospital, Nasser Hospital and Kamal Adwan Hospital.

Starting with Al Shifa, the documentary notes that the order was given to evacuate the hospital in 2023.

Dr Mohammed Abu Salmiya, the lead director at Al Shifa hospital, is interviewed in the documentary and recounts that “We ignored these messages as much as we could not forget that we work at Al Shifa hospital. Because it was the backbone of the entire health system in Gaza. By stopping al-Shifa from operating, you have disabled the whole health system in Gaza. As we did not abide by the messages, they started sending us rockets.”

As Ramita Navai notes, “On November 3rd (2023) , an Israeli strike hit a convoy of ambulances exiting the (Al Shifa) hospital. The Palestinian Red Crescent said 15 people were killed, and at least 60 were injured.”

She notes that “Three days later the hospital’s solar panels were struck, destroying one of its last sources of energy” and “On November 10th a tank shell hit tanks outside the hospital. It was the first of several strikes on the hospital in less than 24 hours including on a maternity ward” which was followed by 12 days of strikes.

A leading doctor at the hospital, Dr Mohammed Obeid, said, “A huge number of displaced people and medical staff fled the hospital after that. But some stayed to treat the injured”.

Ramita Navai noted, “Hospital administrators say there wasn’t enough fuel to keep generators running. As a result, they say at least 40 patients, including four premature babies, died”.

She noted that “Medical staff dug a mass grave”.

Israel finally raided Al Shifa hospital based on the fabricated claim that the hospital was a Hamas command centre. As Navai noted, “The IDF finally raided al Shifa. It failed to provide sufficient evidence showing the existence of a key Hamas command centre, and Israel has continuously prevented access for an independent investigation.”

As Navai recounted, many of Al Shifa’s top doctors relocated to the Indonesian hospital, including Dr Mohammed Obeid and Dr. Adnan al-Bursh.

But as Ramita Navai noted, soon after the Israeli attack on Al Shifa, “the Indonesian hospital and its vicinity were also targeted by the IDF”.

She noted that “Dr al-Bursh’s ward was struck on November 20th, and 12 patients in the ward were killed.”

Following this, “Three days later, the Israeli army issued evacuation orders, then raided and shut down the hospital.”

The two doctors, Dr Mohammed Obeid and Dr. Adnan al-Bursh, then relocated to Al Adwa Hospital.

The two Doctors were able to get the hospital to be partially functioning after IDF attacks, but the Israeli army then forced the hospital to evacuate.

Dr Mohammed Obeid was interviewed in the film and said, “The Israeli army gave the hospital an ultimatum”, saying, “They told us they have a full record of every single person in the hospital, and if anyone stayed, they might either destroy it or kill the women and children”.

The documentary also uncovered an intentional Israeli strike on Dr. Khaled Hamouda, one of the leading doctors at the Indonesian hospital, who relocated to the Kamal Adwan Hospital.

Ramita Navai noted, “On December 3rd, 2023, his house was hit by a direct air strike and 10 of his family members were killed, several of whom were doctors”.

After the targeted strike on his home, he and the living members of his family moved down the road, believing “we were safe now because the air strike was finished and the building was almost destroyed”.

But as Navia noted, “about 10 of you sat outside this building on the road, and that’s when a drone strike hit”.

“My family and I, my wife and children, were attacked at that very moment. I have no doubt it was intentional,” said Dr. Khaled Hamouda, referring to the second targeted strike that killed his wife and daughter.

He then sheltered with his remaining family members at the Kamal Adwan Hospital, only to be detained by the IDF when the hospital was raided.

As Navai noted, “Khlaed Hamouda and his surviving family joined thousands of others taking refuge in the grounds of his workplace, Kamal Adwan Hospital- for a week the hospital was bombarded before being raided and forcibly evacuated. The UN said Israel detained over 70 medics, Khlaed was amongst them and was separated from his two surviving children.”

Hamouda was sent to a brutal Israeli black site and forced into a concentrated pit with hundreds of other detainees.

Pictured Above: Dr. Khaled Hamouda (far-left) and three of his colleagues forced into an Israeli blacksite

Navai noted, “Khaled said he was taken to an adjacent building and interrogated” with him saying that “Surprisingly, he (IDF soldier) became more interested when I said I was a surgeon at the Indonesian hospital. He shook his head and called for someone to take me away, and he began to beat me”.

Navai noted that “After eight hours in which he says he and others were violently beaten, Dr Hamouda was transported to Israel”.

Talking about his time in Israeli detention, Dr Hamouda said, “I was handcuffed and blindfolded and I was taken and thrown in a truck, it was an inhuman situation”.

Ramita Navai said, “Barely a week after his daughter and wife were killed, Dr Hamouda was in Israeli detention. He says he was held in stress positions and on one occasion forced to grip barbed wire”.

She noted that “After three weeks, he was released without charge”.

The targeting of Dr. Khaled Hamouda and his family by the IDF was far from an isolated incident. Dr. Layth Hanibali, a researcher for the Institute for Palestine Studies, was interviewed in the documentary and noted that he had “documented the deaths of 118 doctors” in Gaza, “65 of them killed in their own homes”.

Ramita Navai noted that after Al Shifa hospital was attacked, the biggest hospital in Gaza was Nasser Hospital in the South of Gaza.

The documentary profiles Dr Khaled Al Serr, one of the hospital's top doctors, who was “disappeared” (more on it later) by the IDF.

His mother is interviewed saying, “Klaed is my youngest child, my sixth, he studied medicine in Gaza, and he was among the youngest students. Two months before the war started, he was in the UK,” and his brother saying, “There was no traces of them or anything connected to Khaled”.

One of his colleagues was interviewed, saying, “Dr Khaled al Serr was one of the best doctors at our hospital. He did his best to serve the hospital until the last minute.”

Just like in all the other cases, Ramita Navai noted that “The Israeli army had surrounded Nasser (hospital) for weeks” and “ The IDF began striking the hospital and its vicinity and cutting off supplies”.

Once the hospital was evacuated by the IDF, doctors in the hospital “Filmed people being targeted by Israeli snipers at the hospital gate”.

Navai noted, “During this period, hospital staff told us at least 14 people were killed by a sniper or drones. A mass grave was dug for them and the many others who had died on the hospital grounds, just as in Al Shifa”.

She went on to note that “Inside the Hospital, Dr Khaled al Serr was filming the patients who remained and Israeli soldiers who rounded people up. Like in other hospital raids, Palestinians were stripped and bound. Even patients still in their beds were zip tied”.

She noted that “70 medics were detained during the raid”.

She noted that “Weeks later, the hospital was raided again” and “This time, doctor Klaed Al Serr was taken”.

Ramita Navai noted that these cases profiled in the documentary match the pattern laid out in the 2024 UN report titled “Attacks on hospitals during the escalation of hostilities in Gaza” which notes Israel’s attacks on Gaza’s hospitals consist of a repeated pattern of:

(a) airstrikes or shelling on the hospitals and/or in the hospital’s vicinity, often resulting in serious damage to the hospitals’ premises and equipment;

(b) besieging the hospitals with ground troops, preventing Palestinians from accessing the hospital and blocking medical supplies;

(c) raiding the hospital with the assistance of heavy machinery, including tanks and bulldozers;

(d) detaining medical staff, patients and their companions, as well as the IDPs sheltering inside the hospital;

(e) forcing remaining patients, IDPs and others to leave the hospital; and finally;

(f) withdrawing troops from the hospital, leaving in their wake severe damage to the structures, buildings and equipment inside, effectively rendering the hospital non-functional.

Israel’s Barbaric Torture Of Doctors.

While the first half of the documentary focuses on Israel’s targeting of hospitals in Gaza, the second half exposes Israel's mass torture of doctors who are taken into Israeli detention.

Khaled Zabarga, a lawyer representing multiple detained Palestinian doctors, is interviewed and says, “Detainees were stripped and sexually assaulted. They used sticks and forced them to into the detainees anus and caused an internal bleed, other detainees had broken skulls and other parts, due to the beating and torture. The detainees also said that after being tortured, they saw other prisoners die before his eyes”.

The aforementioned Dr Khaled al Serr turned out to be in detention in the Israeli military prison Sde Teiman which is “notorious after reports of torture, rape and abuse”.

One of his colleagues, who was released, stated he saw al Serr being tortured, saying, “One of my colleagues next to me called Kahled Al Serr. His beard was plucked with pliers in front of my eyes. His beard was plucked. He is one of hundreds I know”.

A former IDF soldier who was at the Sde Teiman said, “Even before going there, I’ve heard rumors of what was done to detainees there, with people bragging about physically abusing them or sort of joking about it, they would say to me that I would have to physically abuse detainees”.

He admitted that “There were a lot of detainees that were known to be detained from the hospitals in Gaza, and the main reason I was told that they were detained is that they were possibly witnesses to hostages either being transported to places or had given care to hostages in Gaza.”

He also admitted that “one of the soldiers who had beaten a detainee, he wouldn’t shut up about it, and I remember the commander being in on it and showing his respect for that. In those sorts of circles, people who guard the detainees sort of see themselves as fighters or something. It was shocking, I’m deeply ashamed”.

The documentary spoke to Dr. Walid Khalil, who was tortured at the Sde Teiman facility and who said, “When I arrived at Sde Tieman prison, I was in a bad way, my ribs were broken. But inside, during interrogation, they would continuously beat me. I went into a room, he took off my boxers, and put diapers on me. I was in diapers the whole time. They hung me up, everyone was hung up, blood flowing from everyone. They started torturing me, they electrocuted me (saying) ‘Say you are Hamas! You are Hamas’. For the duration of my detention, my hands were bound all the time. Some people had their hands amputated”.

Another doctor who was tortured in Sde Teiman, named Saeed Marouf, said, “He’d tell us to sit on our knees for the whole day, ‘sit on your knees.’ You can bear it for half an hour, maybe two, but not 40 or 50 days or two months, it destroys you. We were blindfolded and handcuffed the whole time, it’s very difficult”.

A third doctor who was tortured at the Sde Teiman facility, named Issam Abu Ajwa, said, “One of the interrogators would bring the toilet cleaning brush and tell me ‘I want to brush your teeth with it’ And he broke my front teeth here. Another interrogator got some pliers and pulled my fingernail out. Some (Israeli) paramedics, especially the doctors, were especially violent towards us. I experienced this myself: On one occasion, due to the pain, I was not able to move at all. I asked for the doctor again. The doctor came and he literally told me ‘you're a criminal and you have to die’. He then started to hit me on my legs. Then he said, ‘If you ask for me again, I am going to end your life.’”

An Israeli medic admitted to what Dr. Issam Abu Ajwa described, that even the Israeli doctors tortured Palestinian detainees at Sde Teiman. In the documentary, he said: “I remember at least one case when a very painful procedure was done and the patient gave no consent. No painkillers were administered to him around that procedure, and I was there. I saw that happening, and I saw him screaming, and I saw no one stopping it. I think that was retribution; that was a way to inflict pain. I don’t even think that in the Israeli society, there is a need for a cover-up these days, you can do almost whatever you want when it comes to Gazans, honestly, I think that is how Israeli society has been dehumanizing Palestinians for years”.

Dr. Khlaed Hamouda was also interviewed again in this section, testifying to seeing the Al-Shifa hospital surgeon, Adnan al-Bursh, being tortured to death. He said, “I immediately noticed him, he was with a group of doctors, it was clear that he had been beaten and tortured, so much so that I used to take him to the toilet and bring him back. He told me that he was assaulted on his way here from the hospital, likely in similar condition to when I was detained and repeatedly beaten. I believed that Dr. Adnan was treated differently from the other detainees and even doctors, maybe because he was the head orthopedic at Al Shifa hospital. I don’t like words like died he was murdered he was killed. In one way or another, it was the result of torture”.

While the BBC censored this important documentary to appease the Zionist lobby, thankfully it saw the light of day, and viewers were able to see a glimpse into the barbarity that is Israel’s war against Gaza’s healthcare systems, just one of the endless list of crimes from Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

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