News
Raise up the small voices to get world leaders to stop the genocide in Gaza
View(s):- Urgent call by Sri Lankan humanitarian aid worker of MSF
By Kumudini Hettiarachchi
Speak up, speak up – the small voices matter in giving voice to the voiceless men, women and children of Gaza who are facing apocalyptic conditions. Ask world leaders how they will stop the genocide in Gaza!
This was the plaintive call by a humanitarian aid worker with Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres – MSF), who has served two harrowing stints spanning three months in Gaza, from December last year to June this year.
This Sri Lankan, Pradeep Samanjeeva, Project Medical Referent, MSF, now in Lebanon, was being interviewed by Faye D’Souza, Founder Beatroot News on video, with 10 senior Sri Lankan journalists being invited for a Media Café at the MSF office in Colombo on October 1. The interview was followed by a robust discussion between the journalists and senior MSF staff.
Safety in Gaza is an illusion, says Pradeep Samanjeeva, Project Medical Referent, MSF. Pic courtesy of MSF
As Pradeep relived the horrors of what he saw in Gaza with airstrikes flattening homes, schools and hospitals and causing severe injuries to people; children being targeted as they stood in line to collect food at distribution centres; and hospitals facing evacuation orders at short notice while trying to be functional and helping the flood of injured, it was a flashback for the Sunday Times too.
For, we exclusively interviewed Pradeep, in-between assignments in Gaza, and published an article headlined, ‘He can’t forget Gaza’s children’ on February 16, this year. (https://www.sundaytimes.lk/250216/plus/he-cant-forget-gazas-children-587786.html)
The tragic consequences for aid workers too were obvious – while MSF told the journalists that 13 of its staff had been killed and it was suspending its “vital” medical activities in Gaza City due to the “relentless” Israeli offensive, later reports stated that two more had been killed. Israeli forces had struck a street where MSF teams, all wearing MSF vests clearly identifying them as medical humanitarian workers, were waiting to take a bus to go to work.
Currently, an Israeli-Hamas ceasefire brokered by American President Donald Trump is in place.
Pradeep who has worked in other conflict zones such as Iraq, Syria, Yemen and South Sudan, reiterates that while he was serving in Gaza he felt his life was in danger. “Safety in Gaza is an illusion.”
He speaks of the apocalyptic destruction and prolonged and systematic blockade of food and medical aid, which is causing suffering and also suffocating the people. Air strikes have wiped out families. The systematic destruction spares nothing– houses, hospitals, community centres, schools and universities, with people getting displaced hundreds and thousands of times.
“There is a massacre happening – a humanitarian crisis happening in daylight……….injuries are related to violence, gunshots, air strikes, bombings, burns,” says Pradeep, emotional over having seen more than 20 children once with burns, without arms and legs, without bones and without muscles. Some had lost their eyesight.
He relives the terrible times of holding tight the hands of small children, shaken by nightmares, screaming the whole day, hyper-vigilant, drawing funerals when given a few crayons and playing out death. Children are the most vulnerable group, collecting food and water for their families, standing with metal pots at food distribution centres which have become death traps. They are being targeted!………The biggest child-amputee cohort is here, with no support system. There is a huge void – a huge blank. What will happen, who will take care of them?
The people of Gaza have endured untold suffering
With regard to the biggest misconception around the world that the people of Gaza are resilient, he says they have to be as they do not have a choice. “No child should be resilient to slaughter, genocide and massacre. Being resilient is used to justify what is happening before our eyes and later we will call them survivors.”
Pradeep sends out a clarion call to each and every one out there, to do something, even at this late stage, because those in Gaza have no voice to stop the genocide and get the siege lifted………..“Channel all voices to one place as we are representing human civilization.”
The people of Gaza do not have time to wait for the world to act. Now is the moment, he says, adding with sorrow that “we have taken enough time – 15,000 children have already been killed in Gaza. The people in Gaza need their dignity back. They feel they are powerless and voiceless, that no one cares – their main worry is that the world is watching and not doing anything”.
In the eyes of Pradeep: “Gaza is bleeding. We should ask ourselves if we have done enough as individuals, journalists, activists and world leaders. Had we done enough, we would have saved all the kids who died. Let’s rephrase this question and ask world leaders what their plan is to stop this genocide? This is why we keep calling for a ceasefire and for the siege to be lifted — because without that, there is simply no hope for the people of Gaza.”
| Aid being weaponised to dehumanise the people of Gaza Sending out a powerful call to “dear world leaders” that “your silence is being weaponised”, MSF South Asia’s Executive Director, Parthesarathy Rajendran, said that the precedent of violence set by Israel, risks normalising brutality on a global scale, a danger that impacts everyone. “In Gaza, we are witnessing consistent and undeniable targeting of civilians and weaponising of aid to further dehumanise a population that is already displaced, injured and starved,” he said, urging world leaders to step up and speak out against this systematic dehumanisation and dismantling of institutions that provide crucial oversight. While terms like genocide, war crimes or ethnic cleansing carry political and moral weight, the fact is they have little to no implications without political will for accountability, said Mr. Rajendran, with the evocative plea: “Doctors cannot stop genocide, but world leaders can.” | |
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