Abu Sitta’s experience in Gaza was cited in South Africa’s genocide case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) last January.
‘Germany has prevented Palestinian war surgeon Ghassan Abu-Sitta from entering Berlin to address a conference about his work in Gaza, the surgeon said on social media.
“Invited to address a conference in Berlin about my work in Gaza hospitals during the present conflict. The German government has forcibly prevented me from entering the country,” Abu Sitta wrote on X.
“Silencing a witness to genocide before the ICJ adds to Germany’s complicity in the ongoing massacre.”
The British-Palestinian surgeon was recently elected rector of the University of Glasgow in Scotland.
After spending 43 days treating patients at Al-Ahli and Al-Shifa Hospitals in Gaza, Abu Sitta was forced to flee Gaza in November after Israeli tank fire and lack of anesthetics at Al-Ahli Hospital made it impossible for him to work.
Abu Sitta’s experience in Gaza was cited in South Africa’s genocide case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) last January.
“There was a girl with just her whole body covered in shrapnel. She was nine,” his quote from the ICJ submission read.
“I ended up having to change and clean these wounds with no anesthetic and no analgesic. I managed to find some intravenous paracetamol to give her … her Dad was crying, I was crying, and the poor child was screaming ,” it added.
‘Complicit in Genocide’
Nicaragua has brought a legal case against Germany before the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
Berlin is accused of “facilitating the commission of genocide” against Palestinians in Gaza by continuing to supply weapons to Israel.
According to the case, Germany has violated its obligations under the 1948 Genocide Convention and other norms of general international law by participating in “the ongoing plausible genocide and serious breaches of international humanitarian law and other peremptory norms of general international law occurring in the Gaza Strip”.
Gaza Genocide
Currently on trial before the International Court of Justice for genocide against Palestinians, Israel has been waging a devastating war on Gaza since October 7.
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 33,634 Palestinians have been killed, and 76,214 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza starting on October 7.
Moreover, at least 7,000 people are unaccounted for, presumed dead under the rubble of their homes throughout the Strip.
Palestinian and international organizations say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
The Israeli war has resulted in an acute famine, mostly in northern Gaza, resulting in the death of many Palestinians, mostly children.
The Israeli aggression has also resulted in the forceful displacement of nearly two million people from all over the Gaza Strip, with the vast majority of the displaced forced into the densely crowded southern city of Rafah near the border with Egypt – in what has become Palestine’s largest mass exodus since the 1948 Nakba.
Israel says that 1,200 soldiers and civilians were killed during the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation on October 7. Israeli media published reports suggesting that many Israelis were killed on that day by ‘friendly fire’.