A year on, Israel still holds Gaza doctor Hussam Abu Safia without charge
Dr Hussam Abu Safia, 52, remains in an Israeli prison a year after Israel detained him without charges or trial.
His family and supporters are demanding his release as his health deteriorates amid reports of the inhumane conditions under which he is being held.
Abu Safia, known for his steadfast presence as director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya, north of Gaza City, has become central in international discussions on the protection of medical personnel in armed conflicts.
He insisted on staying at the hospital, along with several medical staff, despite continuous Israeli attacks on the facility.
Israel eventually surrounded the hospital and forced everyone to evacuate. Since then, Abu Safia has been in detention, and the hospital has been out of service.
He was transferred between Israeli prisons, from the notorious Sde Teiman holding facility to Ofer Prison, being mistreated continuously.
No charges have been brought against Abu Safia, who is held under the “unlawful combatant” law, which allows detention without a standard criminal trial and denies detainees access to the evidence against them.
A family’s suffering
Abu Safia is being held in extreme conditions and, according to lawyers, has lost more than a third of his body weight.
His family is worried about him as he also suffers from heart problems, an irregular heartbeat, high blood pressure, skin infections and a lack of specialised medical care.
His eldest son, Ilyas, 27, told Al Jazeera via Zoom from Kazakhstan, where the family fled a month ago, about their grief over Abu Safia’s detention, adding that his father’s only “crime” was being a doctor.
Ilyas, his mother Albina and four siblings stayed with his father at Kamal Adwan through the Israeli attacks, despite opportunities to leave Gaza, especially as Albina is a Kazakh citizen.
On October 26, 2024, Israel killed Ilyas’s brother, Ibrahim, 20, while it shelled the hospital.
“The entire medical staff cried in grief for [my father] and for Ibrahim,” Ilyas said.
The taking of Dr Abu Safia
At dawn on December 27, 2024, the hospital woke up to a tightened Israeli siege with tanks and quadcopter drones.
Israeli tanks had been around Kamal Adwan since mid-October 2024, gradually moving closer – destroying parts of the infrastructure like water tanks – until that day when they were so close nobody could move outside.
