'Nowhere Is Safe in Gaza'
UK medic Dr James Smith reports in to the Byline Times Podcast from the Al Mawasi refugee camp in Gaza
“The population density is phenomenal. I have never worked anywhere, in any humanitarian context, in which people have been in such proximity to one another,” reports Dr James Smith, a UK-based medic currently volunteering at a refugee camp in Gaza’s coastal Al Mawasi district. In an interview with the Byline Times Podcast, Dr Smith - deputy director of the humanitarian policy and practice programme at UCL, London - explained that around 600,000 Palestinians are crammed into an area which was home to just 9,000 people before the current conflict erupted in October 2023.
“There are tents that literally run down to the waterline on the beach,” he said. “There is no land that is not now occupied by shelters for displaced people, and the vast majority are extremely flimsy. We’re talking about tarpaulin stretched out over a wooden or metal frame, and that’s it; nothing more sophisticated than that. There is one desalination plant from which people are able to access desalinated water; but there is nowhere near enough water to serve the population now living in the area. That’s to say nothing of their wider needs: access to education, access to comprehensive healthcare, access to nutritious food, all of the absolute basics that are required to live even a semblance of a dignified life.”
Dr James’ grim dispatch is a timely reminder that 10 months on from a US-brokered ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, conditions have scarcely improved for the vast majority of Palestinians - even those who fled into what was originally designated as a “safe zone” by the IDF. The Al Mawasi camp has been subjected to at least four significant military assaults since 2023, killing more than 150 Palestinians, including women and children. Dozens more have been injured, and Dr Smith said, “the direct military violence hasn’t let up at all. The airstrikes continue, the artillery fire continues, the shooting by soldiers continues. Every week there are, on average, more than 200 security incidents. There are episodes where soldiers are shooting from the territory that they now control. There are Israeli warships positioned visibly on the horizon that are firing onto the coastline, so people are being forced to live in these abject conditions while at the same time still being subjected to military violence.”
He draws a parallel with the nearby city of Rafah, which has been “completely flattened” by the Israelis, despite previously being a place of refuge for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. “There is nowhere that is safe, and that lack of safety continues. We have colleagues that we’re working with, and patients in the catchment area of our clinic, that are living in constant fear of an airstrike, or a drone strike or Israeli warships firing onto the tents on the beach.”
Less than a week ago, Donald’s Trump’s ‘Board of Peace’ held out the promise of Israeli withdrawal from Gaza in return for Hamas and other militant groups agreeing to disarm, yet this ‘historic agreement’ shows no sign of bearing fruit. Attacks on Gaza continued over the weekend, killing at least 26 Palestinians. Dr Smith is, in any case, scathing of the plan which, he says, “lacks any political legitimacy whatsoever. This is not a process that has had any involvement from the Palestinian people. Palestinians have been sidelined in this process. Their voice has been silenced or completely ignored. And this is an extension of various different factors: profound anti-Palestinian racism [and] the dehumanisation of the Palestinian people, such that they are deprived of agency to make decisions over their own lives.
“The Board Of Peace is trying to devise this absurd plan for recovery and rebuilding in Gaza itself, but there’s no mention of accountability. There’s no mention of justice. There’s no mention of an end to the occupation. There’s no mention of an end to Israel’s apartheid conditions imposed on the Palestinian people. All of these bigger questions that concern the the future of Palestine and the Palestinian people, and the the pursuit of of justice, have been completely sidelined. They are nowhere to be seen.”
Watch or listen to the full Byline Times podcast interview with Dr James Smith here.