At 1:08 a.m. on February 19th, we received a brief message from Dr. Khaled Al Serr after three days of silence.

“I lived three days in hell along with my patients; what happened to the people here (doctors, patients, relatives) is unbelievable, even in your worst nightmares,” Khaled told us in a WhatsApp message.

He remains at Nasser Hospital, which has been stormed by the Israeli military. His current wellbeing remains unknown, as the Israeli military has seized control of Nasser Hospital’s patients and medical staff. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the Israeli military has detained at least 70 healthcare workers from Nasser Hospital.

A nurse at Nasser Hospital shared via WhatsApp:

“They raided the building and took us out. They tied our hands behind our backs, on our knees, our heads on the floors… 13 hours without food, water, or access to the bathroom.”

More than 180 patients remain in the hospital, some critically injured. These are the patients that our colleagues—including Dr. Al Serr—stayed behind to care for. Despite the best efforts of the medical team at Nasser Hospital, at least eight patients have died due to a lack of oxygen.

“Many of these patients would have survived were it not for Israel’s direct attack on the hospital,” said Dr. Tanya Haj Hassan, a pediatric ICU doctor. “Forcing Nasser out of function has devastating consequences for the people of Gaza, whose access to medical care is becoming almost non-existent.”

On Friday and Saturday, the Israeli military blocked multiple WHO convoys from entering the hospital.

“This convoy was trying to urgently transfer the most critically ill patients to a functioning hospital where they could receive the care they needed,” said Dr. James Smith, an emergency doctor who has consulted on cases with Khaled. “By blocking humanitarian access in this way, the Israeli military is putting patients in mortal danger.”

After several unsuccessful attempts, a WHO convoy reached the hospital and found acute shortages of food, basic medical supplies, and oxygen. There was no tap water and no electricity, aside from a small backup generator. Upon reaching the now-defunct emergency department, Athanasios Gargavanis, a trauma surgeon for WHO, declared:

“It’s a death zone.”

Dr. Tarek Loubani, a Palestinian-Canadian emergency doctor who worked with Dr. Al Serr in Gaza, stated:

“We don’t yet know the details of the ‘nightmare’ situation that Khaled and the others trapped inside Nasser have endured. However, the Israeli military has a well-documented history of abusing patients and staff during incursions into hospitals in both the West Bank and Gaza. We remain gravely concerned for Khaled Al Serr’s safety and that of everyone else remaining under military control inside Nasser Hospital.”

Dr. Ahmed Moghrabi, who was forced to leave Nasser Hospital in the middle of the night with his family, described families being chased by Israeli military dogs as they evacuated. In an interview with Al Jazeera, he also recounted how the Israeli military abducted his head nurse, demanding:

“Take off all, all the clothes. At midnight, it was cold… He was screaming because they used to beat him.”

These accounts of how Nasser staff have been treated by the Israeli military add to the alarming reports received over the past months concerning the mistreatment of healthcare workers while in detention. Healthcare workers are protected under international humanitarian law and should never be targets, but Israel is currently detaining over 100 medical staff from Gaza.

“Dr. Moghrabi’s horrific description of Israeli soldiers forcing a nurse from Nasser Hospital to strip naked and then beating him aligns with other reports we have received,” said Dr. Rebecca Inglis, who has been working with Healthcare Workers Watch to document the wrongful detentions of healthcare workers in Gaza and the West Bank. “The use of violence and degrading treatment against doctors, nurses, and paramedics are recurring themes in the testimonies we’ve collected. Furthermore, detainees are being denied family contact, medical care, and legal counsel, with no transparency regarding their whereabouts. This is a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law.”

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This press release is sent out on behalf of Healthcare Workers Watch – Palestine, Gaza Medic Voices, and Health Workers for Palestine.