Lebanon: People still being killed by Israeli forces in the south despite ceasefire
MSF responds to overwhelming medical needs as Israeli airstrikes continue daily
Despite a ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon being announced on April 17 and later renewed for three additional weeks, attacks continue in southern Lebanon.
Israeli forces are conducting daily airstrikes, which have killed and injured hundreds of people. Evacuation orders continue to be issued, leading to the forced displacement of thousands of people, while the complete destruction of homes and villages has continued in recent weeks.
“Medical teams in both hospitals are working around the clock to treat those patients, whose injuries can go from minor wounds to more severe ones, requiring advanced surgeries.”
Thienminh Dinh, MSF emergency physician
Hospitals continue to receive wounded people as violence continues
Hospitals in southern Lebanon, where Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) teams are collaborating with the Ministry of Public Health to treat patients, continue to receive wounded people.
“We have seen a range of severe injuries since the start of the nominal ceasefire,” says Thienminh Dinh, an MSF emergency physician who works at Qana and Jabal Amel hospitals, both in the district of Sour/Tyre. “In one family alone, there was a toddler with facial lacerations, his four-year-old sister with compound skull fractures, limb fractures and bruising on her lungs. Their father had varying injuries and their mother was also trapped under the rubble of their home.”
“Medical teams in both hospitals are working around the clock to treat those patients, whose injuries can go from minor wounds to more severe ones, requiring advanced surgeries,” says Dinh.
Between April 18 and May 3, 173 wounded patients were admitted to Jabal Amel hospital and 145 people did not survive their injuries.
A few kilometres away, MSF teams are witnessing a similar situation in the two hospitals we support in the district of Nabatiyeh. Between April 26 and May 3, these hospitals received 65 injured people, including two who later died from their injuries, as well as 26 who arrived deceased.
Overwhelming needs and shortages of essential supplies
Despite ongoing support, including increased capacity for emergency care and ambulance referrals, people are still arriving late or in critical condition due to insecurity and long distances to reach care. In some cases, referrals between hospitals are challenging due to a lack of safety on the road.
However, medical teams have no choice but to refer patients elsewhere due to shortages in essential medical items, such as blood bags, in their facilities. For instance, in Najdeh Al-Shaabiyeh hospital last week, two severely injured patients were meant to be transferred to another hospital because of the blood shortage but died during transfer.
“A Syrian refugee, who is a double amputee due to an airstrike a few weeks ago, woke up to the news that her eight-year-old son was killed in an airstrike, while her daughter had intestinal perforations due to shrapnel. How can we expect a mother to cope with this new reality?”
Thienminh Dinh, MSF emergency physician
Due to high needs, medical teams in southern Lebanon are forced to work up to 36 hours consecutively at faster paces. They sometimes must coordinate several surgical procedures on the same patient at the same time, due to the severity of injuries.
MSF is adapting our ways of working to continue supporting hospital teams, who have been exhausted by more than two months of ongoing strikes and a ceasefire that has failed to provide respite. MSF teams are taking overnight shifts at Qana hospital in Sour/Tyre and in Najdeh Al-Shaabiyeh hospital in Nabatiyeh to ensure continuous care and ease the stress and workload of resident doctors.
People’s mental health is worsening
“We don’t trust this ceasefire, it took all the hope that we had,” says Samia*, a displaced woman from the south who now resides in Barja, a town in the district of Chouf. She returned home as soon as the ceasefire was announced, only to find out that her house was severely damaged. “If I was not feeling well before the ceasefire, now I am 100 times worse.”
To respond to people’s mental health needs, our teams in Nabatiyeh and South governorates are increasing the number and frequency of mobile clinics. We are reaching more remote communities and families who have returned following the ceasefire announcement, whose mental health situation is deteriorating.
“A Syrian refugee, who is a double amputee due to an airstrike a few weeks ago, woke up to the news that her eight-year-old son was killed in an airstrike, while her daughter had intestinal perforations due to shrapnel,” says Dinh. “How can we expect a mother to cope with this new reality?”
Many thought that this ceasefire would bring some relief to them and their families. The reality is different.
“Two months into the escalation, the situation is becoming more complex, with patterns of violence and harm exacerbating over time,” says Jeremy Ristord, MSF country director in Lebanon. “Without meaningful protection and uncompromised access to healthcare, displacement has neither brought safety nor safeguarded civilians.”
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In Qana, Jabal Amel, Nabatiyeh Governmental and Najdeh Al-Shaabiyeh hospitals, MSF teams remain on standby to provide additional support to already-exhausted medical teams in case of mass casualty events. In Jabal Amel, we have sent a surgeon to support the operating room and we are training first responders and providing them with additional resources and equipment in Nabatiyeh and Sour/Tyre.
According to the Lebanese Ministry of Health, 385 people were killed and another 685 were injured between the ceasefire’s announcement and May 4.
*Name changed for privacy.
