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Content warning: graphic descriptions make this a difficult – but necessary – read.
When the bombing started at two in the morning, Shaima was at home with her husband, and three of their four children.
About half an hour later, explosions ripped into the building, killing her husband and two of their kids, one son and one daughter.
Shaima was also badly injured. Her left leg was on fire. She describes how her flesh was melting before her very eyes, how fat was dripping, “as if it was a barbecue,” she says.
Thrown down to the floor, she was just able to reach a water container that had been knocked to the ground nearby. She scooped water from it on to her burning leg.
It took paramedics a long time to find Shaima under the rubble, but as soon as they did, the first thing she said was: “I’m pregnant, save the baby.”
This testimony comes from Human Rights Watch’s new report on pregnancy and maternal health in Gaza under Israeli assault. It’s our first ever report on pregnancy in war zones.
You may think you already understand that pregnant women and girls face additional dangers in conflict areas. You perhaps think you can guess about appalling sanitary conditions and the lack of food, staff, medicines, and live-saving machines, like incubators.
OK, if you feel that way, don’t read the 50-page report. Just watch the five-minute video of Shaima relating her story of the bombing, her attempts to get medical attention, the stillbirth, and her escape from Gaza.
It’s probably not like most Gaza-related videos you’ve seen recently. It’s not showing the horrors people face in a bombing as it happens. It’s not focused on dramatic scenes of buildings collapsing and terrified people running for cover. It’s not sweeping shots of rubble as far as the eye can see.
For the most part, the five-minute video is simply Shaima, sitting upright in a clean, modern hospital bed in Qatar – after more than 40 operations to save her leg and treat other injuries – calmly explaining what happened to her and her family.
And the new video also explains the contexts.
Israel’s military offensive in Gaza following the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, 2023, has severely harmed the healthcare system there.
Israeli authorities have also unlawfully restricted humanitarian aid and medical supplies to people in Gaza, amounting to collective punishment, which is a war crime.
Ceasefire or no ceasefire, as the occupying power in Gaza, Israel has a legal obligation to uphold the right to the highest attainable standard of health for people living in the area, including pregnant women and girls, and their children.
However, two new Israeli laws coming into force this week will make that much more difficult. Among other things, the laws will essentially block the Gaza-related work of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
UNRWA provides water, food, shelter, and other vital services to hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza, including pregnant women, nursing mothers, and newborn children.
Watching Shaima’s story, you understand why Israeli authorities should be facilitating the urgent restoration of healthcare in Gaza. Instead, Israeli authorities are moving in the opposite direction.
