In Gaza, humanity endures. Will the world respond?

EVERY morning in Gaza, our medical team moved bed to bed on ward rounds. A surgeon, an emergency doctor, a physiotherapist and a mental health colleague worked side by side. We would ask each patient how they were feeling, discuss the medical plan, check their wounds, assess infections, and considered what more could be done.

And sometimes, after all this, patients would try to give us something.

An apple. A small packet of coffee. A piece of food. Whatever they had.

That is what stayed with me.

Food was scarce. Clean water was difficult to access. Medical supplies were limited. Many families were living in tents, forced to move again and again, exposed to rain, wind and sand. Some children had never seen an egg before-- because for so long there had been no fresh food, no eggs, no access to the ordinary things many of us take for granted.

Yet inside the hospital, patients and their families would always try to offer us something -- anything they had. Even if it was their last. 

The kindness of Palestinians in Gaza should move us. But it should also shame the world.

Their generosity is not proof that they can endure anything. It is not evidence that they are “resilient” enough to survive the unbearable. Too often, the word resilience is framed as noble suffering, as if people’s strength absolved the world of its responsibility to act.

Yes, Palestinian patients and staff were extraordinarily strong. Our Palestinian colleagues came to work after sleepless nights, dangerous journeys, and devastating news from their own families. Some had lost loved ones, yet still returned to the hospital because patients needed them. They were professional, dedicated and deeply committed to their communities.

But no one should have to be this resilient.

No healthcare worker should have to leave a grieving family to care for another. No patient should have to offer food to a doctor while wondering where their own next meal will come from. No child should grow up not knowing what an egg looks like. No hospital should have to function while medical supplies are blocked, restricted or delayed.

This is what that resilience often conceals: a medical system forced to keep working under impossible conditions.

Even during what was officially called a ceasefire, explosions punctuated daily life. During ward rounds, we could hear them nearby. People would look up, pause, and then continue. Doctors kept seeing patients. Nurses kept working. Families stayed beside hospital beds. Life carried on -- not because this was normal, but because people had no other choice.

That is the danger of prolonged suffering: the unacceptable starts to look routine. A tent becomes a home. An amputation becomes the start of another struggle. A patient survives the operating theatre, only to face an uncertain future outside it.

Sometimes we could save a life, but not a limb. Sometimes, because of infection and limited medical supplies, we had to amputate further to stop the infection from spreading. Even when surgery succeeded, another question remained: what kind of life was the patient returning to?

For many patients in Gaza, rehabilitation, prosthetics and long-term recovery remain deeply uncertain. A young man who loses a leg does not only need surgery. He needs follow-up care, physiotherapy, mobility support, a safe place to live, and the possibility of a future. Without these, survival itself becomes only the first stage of a much longer crisis.

This is why humanitarian access matters. Restrictions, delays and obstruction are not abstract political issues. They decide whether a surgeon has the tools to operate, whether infections can be treated, and whether patients are given a real chance to recover.

This is why we must be careful about how we speak of Palestinians.

They are not only victims in rubble, numbers in death tolls or images of destruction. They are patients who apologise for troubling doctors. Colleagues who make tea when there is barely any food. Families who ask why you are away from your own family during the holidays. People who, in the midst of unimaginable loss, still treat visitors as guests.

That humanity is precisely what makes the world’s failure to stop the continued destruction of Gaza so stark.

If people enduring so much can still show such care for others, what does it say about the international community that has allowed their suffering to continue?

Healthcare must be protected. Patients must be protected. Civilians must be protected. Medical staff, ambulances, hospitals and humanitarian workers must never be targets. These are not optional principles. They are the minimum required to preserve human life and dignity in war.

When people describe Gaza, they often speak of destruction-- rubble, tents, bombing, hunger. These descriptions are true, but they are incomplete.

Gaza is also made up of people who continue to care, to work, to host, to thank, to share, and to hold on to dignity in conditions designed to strip dignity away.

That should not make us admire their suffering.

It should make us demand that it ends.

Ends.

By Dr Lim Chin Siah, a Malaysian Emergency Medicine specialist, who has been volunteering with Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in some of the world’s high-risk conflict zones. Dr Lim was among the last international staff of Doctors Without Borders working in Gaza, until he was forced to leave in February 2026 following the decision of Israeli authorities to deregister Doctors Without Borders and 36 other INGOs from operating in Palestine.

** The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the position of Astro AWANI.