B’Tselem: Israel Causing Collapse of Health System in Gaza Strip

A mother and her sick child in Gaza. (World Health Organization)
A mother and her sick child in Gaza. (World Health Organization)
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B’Tselem: Israel Causing Collapse of Health System in Gaza Strip

A mother and her sick child in Gaza. (World Health Organization)
A mother and her sick child in Gaza. (World Health Organization)

The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories (B’Tselem) warned of the collapse of the health system in the Gaza Strip as a result of Tel Aviv’s policy that makes it difficult for the health system to operate normally.

In a report published on Monday, B’Tselem accused Israel of preventing many patients from leaving the Strip to receive medical treatment.

Instead of facilitating their departure to receive healthcare available a few kilometers away, Israeli authorities obstruct their path through several arbitrary instructions and procedures, thus condemning them to suffer from their illnesses until death, it noted.

B’Tselem explained that thousands of sick people, especially cancer patients, are forced to submit applications for permits to access hospitals in the West Bank, Jerusalem, Israel, or other countries, but only a fraction are accepted.

B'Tselem accused Israel of being slow to approve the applications and only accepts permits for treatments deemed "life-saving", according to the Israeli military assessments.

As for patients who meet the very narrow Israeli conditions, they are forced to follow a hard and arbitrary bureaucratic process that does not guarantee them a permit.

According to data from the World Health Organization, of 15,466 permit applications submitted through the Palestinian Health Liaison Office by patients from the Gaza Strip in 2021, more than half were for treatment in hospitals in Jerusalem. Thirty percent of the requests were for treatment in other hospitals in the West Bank, and only 14 percent were for treatment in Israel.

B’Tselem said that in most cases, applicants receive a response a day prior to their treatment appointment through a phone message informing them whether their application has been approved or rejected by the Israeli authorities or whether it is “still under examination.”

In 2021, the Center said 37 percent of applications were rejected or received no definitive response by the date of their hospital appointment. Also, 38 percent of applications from 4,145 pediatric patients and 24 percent of applications from patients over the age of 60 were rejected or did not receive a response by the date of their hospital appointment.

It added that patients who do not receive a permit to leave Gaza by the date of their appointment are forced to go through the whole bureaucratic process all over again.

The B’Tslelem report corroborates others by Palestinian and international organizations that accused Israel of causing the death of patients from Gaza because they prevented them from leaving the coastal enclave to receive medical treatment.

Last October, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) said that since the beginning of 2021 until August 31, 2022, Israeli authorities obstructed the travel of 5,000 out of 13,270 patients, or 37.6% of the total requests, who applied for travel permits for treatment at the hospitals in the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem, or Israel.



EU Ministers Discuss Deal with Israel to Increase Gaza Aid

European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, center, talks with Poland's Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, left, and Luxembourg's Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel, right, during the EU foreign ministers meeting at the EU Council building in Brussels, Tuesday, July 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)
European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, center, talks with Poland's Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, left, and Luxembourg's Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel, right, during the EU foreign ministers meeting at the EU Council building in Brussels, Tuesday, July 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)
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EU Ministers Discuss Deal with Israel to Increase Gaza Aid

European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, center, talks with Poland's Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, left, and Luxembourg's Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel, right, during the EU foreign ministers meeting at the EU Council building in Brussels, Tuesday, July 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)
European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, center, talks with Poland's Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, left, and Luxembourg's Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel, right, during the EU foreign ministers meeting at the EU Council building in Brussels, Tuesday, July 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)

The European Union is seeking updates from Israel on implementation of a new deal to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza, according to Kaja Kallas, the bloc's foreign policy chief.

Foreign ministers from the EU's 27-member nations are meeting Tuesday in Brussels in the wake of a new aid deal for Gaza largely forged by Kallas and Israeli foreign minister Gideon Saar, The AP news reported.

Saar met with EU leaders on Monday after agreeing last week allow desperately needed food and fuel into the coastal enclave of 2.3 million people who have endured more than 21 months of war.

“We have reached a common understanding with Israel to really improve the situation on the ground, but it’s not about the paper, but actually implementation of the paper," Kallas said before the meeting of the Foreign Affairs Council.

“As long as it hasn’t really improved, then we haven’t all done enough,” she said, before calling for a ceasefire.

Details of the deal remain unclear, but EU officials have rejected any cooperation with the Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Fund over ethical and safety concerns. Opening more border crossings and allowing more aid trucks into Gaza is the priority, but officials say eventually they’d like to set up a monitoring station at Kerem Shalom crossing.

Kallas said the ministers will also discuss Iran’s nuclear program, concerns over developments in Georgia and Moldova, and new sanctions on Russia. The EU is readying its 18th package of sanctions on Russia, with holdouts within the bloc arguing over the keystone policy of capping oil prices to cut into Moscow’s energy revenues.

European nations like Ireland, the Netherlands and Spain have increasingly called for the EU's ties with Israel to be reassessed in the wake of the war in Gaza.

A report by the European Commission found “ indications ” that Israel’s actions in Gaza are violating human rights obligations in the agreement governing its ties with the EU — but the block is divided over what to do in response.

That public pressure over Israel's conduct in Gaza made the new humanitarian deal possible even before a ceasefire, said Caspar Veldkamp, the Dutch foreign minister. “That force of the 27 EU member states is what I want to maintain now," he said.

“The humanitarian deal announced last week shows that the Association Agreement review and use of EU leverage has worked," said one European diplomat.

Spain's Foreign Minister José Manual Albares Bueno said details of the deal were still being discussed and that the EU would monitor results to see if Israel is complying with those.

“We don’t know whether it we will know how it works,” he said. “It's very clear that this agreement is not the end — we have to stop the war."

The war began after Hamas attacked Israel in 2023 on October 7. Israel responded with an offensive that has killed more than 58,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The ministry, which is under Gaza’s Hamas-run government, doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants. The UN and other international organizations see its figures as the most reliable statistics on war casualties.

The EU has observed some aid trucks entering Gaza, but “not enough,” said Hajda Lahbib, the EU Commissioner for humanitarian air and crisis management.

“The situation is still so dangerous, so violent, with strikes still continuing on the ground, that our humanitarian partners cannot operate. So, this is the reality we need to have a ceasefire," she said.