'Children in Gaza are being deliberately shot in head': American doctors

By Hakan Copur

CHICAGO (AA) - Expressing deep concerns and outrage over the horrific scenes they witnessed, American doctors who volunteered in Gaza said children are being deliberately shot in the head by Israeli forces, calling on the US government to take immediate action.

While the Democratic National Convention continued in Chicago, these doctors, along with Democratic delegates, urged the Biden administration to stop sending weapons to Israel.

Speaking to reporters after the conference, the doctors emphasized that what they saw in Gaza was nothing short of "horrific and massive destruction."

Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, a doctor from California who volunteered in Gaza, recounted his first visit to the occupied West Bank in 2007. He described the harsh living conditions faced by the Palestinian family he stayed with at the time.

He shared his recent experience at the European Hospital in Khan Yunis from March 25 to April 8, stating: "Gaza City is a complete disaster. If you think there's something bad happening in the world right now, know that it's happening in Gaza."

- Malnutrition and famine

As a doctor in Gaza, Sidhwa spoke about the unbearable experience of seeing people battling hunger every day, stressing that this situation is deliberately caused by Israel.

"I knew how many children had been killed, I knew about the massive killing in general but I just assumed it was all from bombings. But, children are being shot in the head deliberately every day. Literally, every day I was there I saw a shot in the head," he said.

"That is not an accident. That is the deliberate targeting of children. That's murder," he added.

Sidhwa asserted that the American government cannot support such actions, saying: "The US government should not be funding this."

He added that no one in the world, except for Israelis, could support such a massacre, stating: "At one point, (Israeli Prime Minister) Benjamin Netanyahu said: 'If the Americans cut off arms then we will fight with our fingernails.' Okay good, you go do that."

- Deliberate targeting of children

Dr. Tammy Abughnaim, a Chicago-based doctor who has volunteered in Gaza twice, also spoke about the immense pain she witnessed.

Abughnaim, who has visited Gaza twice in the last six months, described treating hundreds of children and women seriously injured by Israeli soldiers' bullets, bombs, shrapnel, and building debris.

"Between 60-70% of those who make it to the hospital are actually children," said Abughnaim, who worked under extremely difficult conditions in Khan Yunis during her recent mission in July and August.

"I can tell you that I have seen injuries that indicate deliberate targeting of children and deliberate targeting of civilians, so I have seen gunshot wounds to the abdomen of children, to the chest," she said.

Addressing the Biden-Harris administration and the American public, Abughnaim stated that the right thing to do was to stop arming Israel.

"We do not want a single more bomb in our names, with our tax dollars sent to the Israeli government," she added.