Médecins du Monde expects “much stronger diplomatic gestures from Europeans and Americans”

“All indicators are in the red on access to water, food and access to care,” warns the NGO.

The NGO Médecins du Monde is waiting “much stronger diplomatic gestures from the Europeans and the Americans”, for the Gaza Strip, launched Wednesday January 10 on franceinfo Jean-François Corty, doctor, vice-president of Médecins du Monde and associate researcher at Iris, the Institute of Strategic International Relations, while the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip is critical. The distribution of aid must face almost insurmountable obstacles, notes the head of the WHO. “All indicators are in the red on access to water, food and access to care”warns Jean-François Corty.

franceinfo: What is the latest news reaching you from your teams working in the Gaza Strip ?

Jean-François Corty: They reflect the concerns of our United Nations colleagues. The majority of our teams are struggling to work, looking to eat and drink all day long. They are mostly concentrated in the south of the Gaza Strip where you have 90% of the population who have been displaced several times. The situation is particularly difficult because there are intense bombings, particularly between Khan Younes and Rafah, in the South, and which means that there is still no secure place. Humanitarian work is complicated. Hospitals remain potential targets. They are often dying people with problems replenishing medicines. The situation remains tense. And the aid is trickling in.

What is missing in Gaza ?

There are, depending on where you are in Gaza, more or less difficulty in accessing aid which is already insufficient. Aid comes in through Rafah, through Kerem Shalom, in conditions where not everyone can get enough to eat. People in the South sleep under plastic sheeting and spend several hours looking for food and water. And the north or center of the Gaza Strip are very poorly supplied. Pockets of famine are documented in different parts of Gaza, which is not the case throughout the territory. But all the indicators are in the red on access to water, food and access to care. It should be noted that we have more than 60,000 injured, figures which are probably underestimated. That’s a lot of women, children, very serious injuries, crushed limbs, burns with a lot of infections, because for three months the antibiotics have been insufficient. That’s at least 23,000 dead, including 12,000 children, in a situation where bombings remain indiscriminate. A storage location of our MSF colleagues was attacked today, with the death of a staff member.

“There is no place that is safe.”

François Corty, doctor, vice-president of Médecins du Monde and associate researcher at Iris

at franceinfo

The United Nations lost around a hundred people. We also lost a doctor several days ago. So help in these conditions is difficult to provide. You have states which, like France and the United States, put forward humanitarian semantics. They have carried out some actions, either by airdrops, or by taking care of a few wounded on the Egyptian side, mainly because of the indiscriminate bombings and the blockade which does not allow aid to enter massively. We expect much stronger diplomatic gestures from the Europeans and the Americans who can still influence this very deadly strategy of the Israeli army on Palestinian civilians.

Has the intensity of the bombing decreased? ?

No. Every day, we have contact with our teams. And they again told us that last night, the bombings on Khan Younès were very heavy and that this had a strong impact on the ability to be able to move around and work on a daily basis. The humanitarian space of humanitarian actors is increasingly constrained. It is exclusively practically concentrated in the south of the Gaza Strip, in a few hospital centers which are functional. And it must also be said, there are hundreds of deaths in the West Bank, where the situation in Tulkarem, in Nablus, has greatly deteriorated, where it is difficult to be able to renew visas for expatriate teams.

Gazans do not need humanitarian posturing from states. They need respect for their lives, their survival and they aspire to peace, like any normally constituted human being.

Jean-François Corty

at franceinfo

On December 22, there was a vote in the Security Council to bring more aid on the ground, particularly in Gaza. On the ground, in concrete terms, we do not see massive aid coming in. So today, a ceasefire is necessary to save lives. This is necessary so that more proportionate aid comes in.