Wounded Syrians find sanctuary in Israeli hospital
As
the conflict in Syria continues, the number of injured Syrians reaching
Israel to receive treatment is rising. The Syrian regime is a longtime
Israeli enemy, and its citizens are banned from travel to Israel.
Meanwhile Israelis citizens, worried about a possible chemical attack,
are lining up at gas mask distribution centers. NBC's Geraint Vincent
reports.
By Geraint Vincent, Correspondent, NBC News
NAHARIYA,
Israel - In northern Israel, wounded Syrians are finding a strange
sanctuary. Just a few miles from the Golan Heights, doctors have
treated more than 70 patients from Israel’s arch-enemy Syria so far this
summer.
They are all very badly hurt, with gunshot wounds and blast injuries, and receiving life-saving treatment, doctors say.
"Most
of them arrive unconscious," said Masad Barhoum, clinical director at
Western Galilee Medical Center. "When they wake up and find that they
are in Israel they are anxious and afraid. We don't ask them any
questions, we just do what we can to make them feel comfortable."
Doctors
and nurses do their work behind blast walls and air-tight doors, and
they try not to let politics, or war, get in their way.
"When you see a child who's burned and crying for her mother,"
Barhoum said. "What is she guilty of? We help whoever comes through
the door.”
A look back at the conflict that has overtaken the country.
At
least 100,000 people have been killed in the two-and-a-half-year
conflict, and every day hundreds struggle with injuries, according to
aid workers. Doctors at the center say their Syrian patients are brought
to the border with Israel because much-needed medical facilities no
longer exist in their war-ravaged homeland. It's a last resort.
Syria
and Israel are old foes. For people to throw themselves and their
loved ones on the mercy of the Israeli border guards is a sure a sign of
how desperate they are. Seeking help across the border may prompt
harsh consequences when patients and their families go home.
Many of the wounded are fighters, but some are children.
“I
brought my girl here because she was hit by a sniper's bullet," said a
weeping woman as she tended her 13-year-old. "The hospital in my town
was destroyed. They have saved her here, but now I am afraid to go
back. We will be marked."
The Israeli army delivers the wounded
to the hospital, in between preparations for a possible attack from
Syria or Hezbollah, Lebanese allies of President Bashar Assad.
If
the United States and its allies choose to strike over allegations
Syria used chemical weapons on civilians, Assad might retaliate against
Israel, America's greatest ally in the region. Israeli intelligence
doesn't think that is very likely at this stage, but the missile defense
batteries along Israel's northern borders have been reinforced.
As
citizens of Damascus try to prepare themselves for a possible military
strike, they are stocking up on supplies at grocery stores and
pharmacies. Wall Street Journal correspondent Sam Dagher reports.
In
Tel Aviv, people look north and see a dictator who appears to be
capable of anything, who might be feeling backed into a corner and could
lash out. And given the nature of the atrocity Assad is accused of
committing, people wait in line for gas masks at the post office. The
prospect of being attacked with poison gas is a fearful one anywhere,
but for a people haunted by the Holocaust there is a special
determination to survive, and respond.
If Israel does come under
attack of any kind, it will not simply weather the storm. Prime
minister Binyamin Netanyahu has warned that his country will “respond
forcefully.”
Israel's defense forces are on high alert. Its air
force pilots are on very short notice to move -- they now have to be in
their cockpits within seconds of the call, rather than minutes.
An
Israeli attack on Syria would likely be large scale, and Assad's allies
in Lebanon and Iran would feel bound to respond. This would be one
path by which a “punishment action” by the Western powers might quickly
turn into a regional conflict. In the White House, it's the nightmare
scenario.
I responded quickly:
This makes me proud to be a Jew. I LOVE my people and know in my
heart and deep in my soul that the Jewish people are good, incredible
survivors and most act like human beings should to one another. I am
NOT religious but a secular Jew and never ever not even once have I been
shunned by a member of a different Jewish sect. That in and of itself
is miraculous and says something. There is room in Judaism for all of us
whether we believe or not.
I know because I have seen it through many different eyes that Israel treats everyone who comes
for medical aid. NO questions asked they just do it. Why? Because
it's the right thing to do. You treat the stranger as you would want to
be treated. Forgetting the gd political situation on a human level I
know my people and the fact that they treat desperate Syrians for
medical problems that otherwise would kill them does not surprise me. I
say OPEN YOUR EYES and look. Do I love all policy NO and neither do I
love all policy in the US BUT we do the best we can with the cards we
are dealt.
Thank you my people for tending to the wounded Syrians. One wonders
how much press that will get. Instead the media focus on some bad thing
that happens between these so called "enemies," They are NOT MY
enemy. They are fellow human beings who desperately need help to merely
live!
