S2J News had the pleasure to interview Dr. Mohammed Mustafa. With Palestinian roots and a refugee family history, Dr. Mustafa trained in some of the world’s top hospitals, but when the ceasefire in Gaza shattered, he didn’t stay on the sidelines. Instead, he flew directly into the crisis zone—not once, but twice—volunteering at Nasser and European Hospitals in Khan Younis.
Ahmad Manzoor: Jazakumullahu Khair Doctor for joining us today. I want to start with some of the current stories and get your experiences and reactions. Opioids have been discovered in US-backed aid essentials such as flour, specifically oxycodone. How do you respond and what were your on the ground experiences whilst in Palestine?
Dr Mustafa: They’ve been trying to break the spirit of the people of Gaza, they’ve been trying to break the social cohesion. Obviously bombing them, killing them, starving them hasn’t worked, so the measures have become more extreme. Now we’re seeing things like the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which is essentially funnelling people into cages and gunning them down.
The distribution sites are only open for an hour. So people might walk and travel and sit for 2, 3 hours waiting for it to open before they approach. They shoot some people as they begin to approach the distribution site and then they kill them, which makes people more desperate.
And what the idea is to break down the social cohesion. There have been stampedes and people fighting over aid, but generally overall you see the cohesion within the Gaza community. So the next step is to flood Gaza with drugs. You know, this isn’t the first time something like this has happened. In the West Bank, they once flooded all the TV networks with pornography.
No matter how resilient these people are, when you start killing their children, when you start starving them, when you start throwing drugs into food, because they know people won’t take this willingly so they’re throwing it into food while they’re starving. This is all part of a wider agenda and I think what you’ll see is if this continues to go on you’ll see more and more extreme measures being taken to break down social cohesion.
Ahmad Manzoor: Some breaking news today that a British Israeli soldier named Natan Rosenfeld has been killed in Gaza. Now this has gained a lot of traction in the media and it’s been reported widely. How do you see the disparity between when things like this happen from the side of the IDF versus the disproportionate representation of the murdered Palestinians?
Dr Mustafa: Well let’s be clear, the IDF is on trial essentially with the International Court of Justice. So these IDF soldiers, on a human level, you can feel sorry for the families and sorry for any death of life. But on a practical basis, these are people who are involved in an army where it is committing war crimes and mass extinction of life. The fact that this is a British citizen, a British citizen serving in a foreign army, a foreign army that’s on trial for genocide.
And there are bigger issues here that are going on. Why is it that British citizens are allowed to join foreign armies and why are they allowed to join foreign armies that are actively committing genocide on a civilian population. So, to be honest with you, I think this is an opportunity for the Palestine movement and the pro-Palestine movement to latch onto these stories and ask the questions, why are these British citizens joining a foreign military, a foreign military on trial, that should be the conversation. There are plenty of people making noise about the number of dead in Gaza and the amount that are being killed, but What we need to focus on is we need to focus on the other strands of this, is the enabling these British citizens who are soldiers in this army. That’s another strand that we need to stop.
It’s all good stopping the weapons coming out of Britain to Israel and the parts, but we also need to stop is the military personnel going there. And that’s another thing that I think people should be focused on.
Ahmad Manzoor: Recently, there’s been the push and now the formalisation of banning Palestine Action, an organisation that is active in trying to stop the weapons manufacturer of the IDF. They will be proscribed as a terrorist organisation. What’s your reaction to that and to the kind of marginalising of Palestinian voices and advocacy work?
Dr Mustafa: If the government want to ban certain protests and political [activism], certain protests and forms of protests and they want to label things as terrorist. If that’s the threshold, throwing paint on an army plane, then what’s with the ICJ rulings? Why are we not following them? Why are we not openly following the criminal court for arrest warrants for Netanyahu? My problem with this is the inconsistency.
If you want to go down this route of stopping and clamping down on any kind of dissent that makes people feel uncomfortable in any way, shape or form, I think a lot of people are uncomfortable with the fact that a live stream genocide is going on, that international courts have ruled and these rulings are not being abided by. So we can’t call ourselves a country of law and order and a country that follows the rules if we’re prescribing one group as a terrorist organisation while another group is on trial for genocide and terrorism, war crimes, and we’re not even having the conversation of prescribing them as a terrorist organisation. It’s just the hypocrisy of what’s going on here and the inconsistency. And I think that’s where really people should be latching onto the inconsistencies.
How we’re so quick, within a couple of weeks after the actions of Palestine Action that we’re willing to put them on a terrorist watch list, but after countless ICJ rulings and international organisations coming out calling it a genocide, we can’t even call it a genocide in Parliament House. I mean, this is huge hypocrisy.
Ahmad Manzoor: When you were on the ground, did you interact with a lot of UK organisations, either humanitarian or formally sent from the government. And what were your interactions and your view of those organisations?
Dr Mustafa: Individually, the doctors that are going there, the aid workers there, they’re all doing fantastic work. When this genocide stops, there’ll be a flooding of international journalists and things become more open and apparent. I think what you’re going to find is shocking details about how different NGOs operated in Gaza, there’s exploitation of aid. You know, the Israeli government says there’s exploitation of aid by Hamas, but the real exploitation of aid happens outside of Gaza.
It happens with how much aid is paid for, the inflation of the prices, the inflation of lorries going into Gaza, the tax and the commissions that aid agencies get for every lorry going in. This is probably a huge issue that I think once actually we’ve managed to feed the people of Gaza because we’re limited to the mechanisms that we have.
I think there’s going to be huge investigations into actually how this aid was distributed, how aid was done and conducted in Gaza and who got rich off this because a lot of people have profited from this because remember people trying to leave Gaza as well, they have to pay $10, 000.
People are making money off children being evacuated from Gaza injured children and injured families, so you know this whole thing when it comes to NGOs, there’s a much wider picture here.
Ahmad Manzoor : So those NGOs, are they unregulated there on the ground level? Or do you think they’re actively being enabled to go there and take advantage of the situation as it stands?
Dr Mustafa: How can you coordinate things on the ground in Gaza? The restrictions are so tight to what you can and can’t do and what you can and can’t bring in. There are some aid organizations that are doing amazing and fantastic work, given the limitations, but there are other aid organizations that seem to have access to certain parts of Gaza that other aid organizations don’t have.
The continued campaigning and fundraising from different aid organizations, yet none of their aid is getting into Gaza. So, where’s all the aid going? There’s no transparency with this. And one of the biggest factors is that so many people want to help, that there’s a flood of donations and money. But a lot of that, where is it all going?
Any aid going into Gaza is helpful, no matter how it’s being brought in, how exploited it is, we just need to feed children that are dying. But these are wider conversations that need to be have when all of this is over.
Ahmad Manzoor: The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the US backed supposed aid facility, is now being labelled as being complicit in international crimes. What was your experience of dealing with them?
Dr Mustafa: Some Israeli soldiers had said that they felt like they were the Nazis and the Palestinians were the Jews. I mean if this isn’t self-condemning enough where you have IDF soldiers admitting that they were shooting at unarmed civilians, where you have IDF soldiers saying they actually feel like they’re committing war crimes, this is when you take into account the propaganda, the brainwashing, and to come out and say ‘I was the one that felt like a Nazi in there’, I think it just shows you how blatantly open and disregard for human life there is in Gaza. To mow down starving women and children waiting in a line for food is outrageous.
I think the GHF, it’s really changed the dial and how people talk about this situation because you’ve seen a shift in tone from media, in the tone in politicians and the general public, and you’ve seen people more willing now to call it for what it is. I think the GHF has been one of the biggest driving factors in the change in public opinion.
Ahmad Manzoor : What were some of your interactions with the IDF like?
Dr Mustafa: Our interactions with them were at the borders. I remember when we left Gaza, they searched all our bags, everybody, everyone on the UN convoy. We were British, American, Australian, Canadian. And [there was] anger and the resentment as we were leaving.
They would open up our bags, they would rummage through all our bags, which look, I understand security protocol, look through all you want, right? But it was just an absolute disregard for our own property. The throwing the bags on the floor, the manner in which we were questioned, the aggression, the guns being held in. The disregard and the disdain that they had for us, the fact that we were in there in Gaza providing any kind of help, was quite evident to see.
Before we get into Gaza, it’s the fact that half of our team of doctors were all denied entry from going into Gaza. Why is that a thing?
Before we even enter cars, the interactions that we have with them (IDF) is they’ve banned half the team from coming in. You were treated like the enemy.
Ahmad Manzoor: Zalmay Khalilzad, a former US ambassador, has commented about the futility of the UN and their kind of presence in Gaza and what they’re doing. What was your experience of the UN forces and envoys and their kind of impact?
Dr Mustafa: The UN is the driving force of humanitarian aid in Gaza. The issue is the UN has been gutted over the last 2 years. The UN has come under scrutiny by the Israelis, the destruction of UNRWA facilities all around Gaza, the banning of UNRWA by Israel. These things are deliberate tactics because UNRWA holds in it and it enshrines the right to return for Palestinian refugees.
When I was there, UN safe houses were bombed and UN workers were killed. The UN actually made the decision to move out half of their personnel from Gaza because it was just too dangerous. Never have more UN workers been killed.
I think this goes to show you that the UN is under actual physical. It’s under diplomatic attack in media circles within Israel, within the US, and it’s also under financial attack. And a lot of their programs are being gutted by the United States with the cutting of funding of USA aid and things like that. The UN are facing an uphill struggle to really do anything in Gaza.
They’ve become ineffective because of the [US] veto. They can’t bring about a ceasefire because of the American veto. There’s the physical attack, the financial attack, the political attack, and then there is the actual diplomatic weakening of the UN as well by the vetoing. Is there some blame to lay at the feet of the UN? Of course there is. I don’t think they’ve been nearly as active enough as they should be.
Ahmad Manzoor: What was your experiences of the news organizations that were on the ground because there are trickles of information that we do get from the side of the Palestinians is again coming through very specific channels. What were your interactions with them?
Dr Mustafa: How were they doing ground level work and how were they actually managed to get news stories out without being affected or being compromised?
They’ll have Palestinians who are just there as cameramen, who’ll go over there, will film you, they’ll have a microphone, they’ll pull a microphone on you, they’ll give you an earpiece, and someone will ask you questions through the piece and it might be, you know, a CNN, it might be an ABC, it might be a BBC. These are the kind of interactions that you have, Al Jazeera, these are the kind of organizations, but then there’s a lot of other smaller media channels and groups that try. The journalists are being killed all the time. It’s difficult to travel to certain areas.
The journalists that are able to do the reporting, go into these militarized zones, report what’s actually going on in the ground. A lot of them are then targeted. It’s a very dangerous game of being a journalist in Gaza.
Ahmad Manzoor: Benjamin Netanyahu has been quoted as saying that he won’t stop the war in Gaza, even if Hamas was to release any alleged soldiers that they hold. What’s your reaction to that.
Dr Mustafa: I mean, look, on a human level, you can sympathise with people that are taken as hostages, right? But my sympathy extends to the thousands taken as hostages in Israeli dungeons that have been documented, tortured, some raped to death. Even the guys from the flotilla that were arrested even for a few days. You know, when they were released, a lot of them had scabies after being in Israeli jails for a few days. That shows you how poor the conditions are in Gaza.
For Netanyahu this is about his political survival. None of this is to the benefit of Israel. None of this has made Israel safer. This is an expansionist government. This is a government that wants to secure more and more land.
The only piece that they want is a piece of land here, a piece of land there, a piece of Lebanon, a piece of Syria, a piece of Gaza, a piece of the West Bank, a piece of the Sinai, piece of Jordan. That’s all they want. So I think that’s beginning to come to the forefront. I think the world is beginning to see that Israel is not an honest broker for peace, it’s not an honest partner for peace. And I think more of all of the world are beginning to realise that.
What is the world going to do to bring about peace? Because we can’t have a peace talks like we did with the Oslo Accords, we signed a peace treaty and then the Israelis implement the peace as and when they see fit because they’re not doing that. So, this needs to be a peace that’s forced upon both sides.
Ahmad Manzoor: What was the Palestinian reaction to international involvement or allegiances and coalitions with possibly other Muslim countries that might be able to aid or assist the cause. What was their morale?
Dr Mustafa: They were more encouraged by the grassroots movement of the pro-Palestine cause, the protests on the streets, the people blocking roads, the students doing the encampments. This was more inspiring for them because they saw, you know, non-Muslims, non-Arabs, non-Palestinians, essentially some of them throwing away their whole education at these colleges getting suspended and stuff just to defend Palestinian rights. So more people were more inspired by the grassroots movements than by governments. They had no faith left in any of these Arab governments or in any of these other bigger players like Iran or anything like that, because I think everybody just felt that these countries have their own interests at heart first, before they have the Palestinian interest.
Whereas with these students on the ground and these protesters, these are people who are really giving up whatever little they have for the Palestine movement and I think that was more inspiring for them than any state level actor.
Ahmad Manzoor: At the Glastonbury Festival, one of the singers had inititaed chants about freeing Palestine and death to the IDF. Now the backlash to this has been quite widespread and selectively condemned. What’s your opinion of this backlash?
Dr Mustafa: We have to point out the hypocrisy of it. People are more offended by words and chants than they are to actual people dying. You know, when he was saying “death, death to the IDF”, the IDF just killed 53 people that day. They killed dozens of people that day. Why is there more outrage over someone chanting death, death to the IDF, which is an army that’s on trial for genocide.
It’s an army that openly brags and videos and records and posts their war crimes to the world. It’s an army that leaves babies in incubators to rot to death. It’s an army that’s bombed multiple hospitals, right? There’s more outrage over the chant of people showing their anger towards the IDF, that there is about the crimes that the IDF have caused.
This further plays into the dehumanization of Palestinian people, that they can do all of this death and destruction and flatten Gaza. But yet the moment somebody says anything remotely offensive to them or harmful to them, all of a sudden that becomes the major headline news. It’s the reaction and not what’s caused the reaction, the root cause of the reaction, which is the war crimes. That’s why Non-Muslims are the ones leading these chants now. And Muslims don’t tend to go to Glastonbury.
Essentially, it’s non-Muslim artists that are leading these chants, which I think goes to show you the amount of disdain that people have for what they’re witnessing on their TV screens. And again, the media refuses to acknowledge this. And because of that, you get widespread public reaction, which is this, this is what happens.
Ahmad Manzoor: What potential solutions do you see either working or coming to fruition in the future that may be able to provide an outlet and a source of relief for the Palestinian people?
Dr Mustafa: Well, I think initiatives that I’m trying to get on board with is at the state level. Have a state run hospital, having a British hospital there and taking away power. It’s crazy to me that we’re giving the power to aid distribution, to keep people alive, to a country that is on trial for the genocide of their said same people. It’s insane. It’s like a Black Mirror episode. So we need to take that power away.
Ahmad Manzoor: Being a medical professional in the UK, what advice or practical strategies would you give other medical high ranking professionals like yourself, to actively aid the Palestinian people?
Dr Mustafa: Things have changed. The BMA, the British Medical Association has just come out and said that anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism, hat criticising the state of Israel is not anti-Semitic in itself. This really has changed now the voices of healthcare workers, and this should be actually something that’s empowering because now what they’re basically saying is one of the main governing bodies is they’re saying that actually if you talk out about Israel you shouldn’t be prosecuted, you shouldn’t be prosecuted for having pro-Palestine views and you shouldn’t be prosecuted as a doctor for saying that genocide is wrong.
So I think the tide is turning, and I think that if you’re a doctor, this is your moment now to speak up, and it’s to speak up with other voices.
Organise. Don’t just make it 1 doctor or 2 doctors, get a group of doctors that release a joint statement. That’s the way that you protect yourself, together. So many doctors are outraged at what’s going on and the destruction of healthcare facilities all over Gaza. And then I think there will be a coordinated, I think there will be a lot of change that will come if we actually move in a unified way.
Ahmad Manzoor: What do you see as the future for our Palestinian brothers and sisters?
Dr Mustafa: There’s a lot of backdoor dealings here. You know you look at what’s happening in Syria right now, they’re talking about normalisation of Syria with Israel and they’re talking about if there is normalisation then they have to give up the Golan Heights. There’s things working here behind the scenes and you know who imposed the new Syrian regime or the Syrian people?
So it’s very difficult to tell actually what’s going on and what’s going to happen next. I just think though that everybody, no matter what happens, needs to be united here. We need to have all fractions of the pro-Palestine movement together and we need to keep making noise and not being silent until we get a free and just society in that part of the world.
Ahmad Manzoor: What other causes do you think also need to be advocated for or specifically reported on?
Dr Mustafa: You know, for that particular individual and that particular conflict zone, for them that’s their entire world. I think what you have to understand is there are a lot of places like Sudan, the Congo, Palestine. These are conflicts fundamentally about resources.
They’re about resources and about land. And they’re about influence, geopolitical influence in that part of the world. And what Palestine represents is it represents the cross section of all these other conflicts all around the world. You know, there’s certain places around the world where Islamophobia is the driving force to the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya and things like that. The Gaza situation represents Islamophobia as well.
There are land grabs, there’s ethnic cleansing, which again is what these are, which is what’s happening in Sudan and Darfur and places like that. Gaza represents all of these things. And I think that fighting over a free Gaza essentially is fighting for all of their freedom as well. And I think what Gaza is doing is Gaza is highlighting the injustices and these issues and it’s bringing it to the forefront.
And I think we should amplify all these other struggles, all their voices and all the things that are happening. But like I said, I think Gaza is a good vehicle for all of those other issues because once we get a mechanism and a system in place in Gaza that brings justice to Gaza, that’s what will happen to these other, hopefully, conflicts as well. Push that drive and I think we could we can start driving all of these things. It’s just, you know, we’re all human beings. We all have busy lives.
Ahmad Manzoor: We have talked about the strong will and the iman of our Palestinian brothers and sisters. Sometimes it amazes people that go from other countries to see how they’re dealing with it. Can you end with a story of hope and how that inspired you?
Dr Mustafa: You know, I remember when we had a mass casualty event and we picked up a little boy off the floor and we put him on the bed and we were dealing with him. And he had a massive open wound on his back. He was cut and bruised everywhere.
He (young boy) had shrapnel injuries. I was trying to get him to hold still and he kept sitting up off the bed and he kept saying: “Wallahi, I will never leave this land, no matter what they do to me.”
I remember thinking this is an injured child and he is so adamant that he wants to make it known to us, the people treating him, that this doesn’t change his determination for the land, that him being injured, he wants to show that he’s not scared. I remember thinking SubhanAllah, this is a child. You see what happens when a child, when you’re trying to change a plaster, they cry. He’s got a massive wound on his back, like it’s gushingly open, he’s bleeding from his face, he’s got shrapnel injuries everywhere and he’s refusing to hold still because he wants to make it clear to all of his doctors here that are looking after him and all the nurses that this doesn’t change his resolve, that he’s here to stay. And I thought that was really powerful.
And it just goes to show you the resilience of these people that even when they’re faced with their own extermination, that they refuse, they refuse to buckle of who they are and what they represent. SubhanAllah, they are some of the most beautiful people on earth.
