About us

Medical neutrality means that medics, patients, wounded soldiers and healthcare facilities can never become a target during wars. It means that even in the barbary of war certain rules and laws need to be followed. Healthcare workers have a right and even a duty to speak out to defend those laws and protect the very principle of medical neutrality.

We believe that only trying to give medical assistance to Gaza and the occupied territories, without tackling the fundamental problem of apartheid and occupation, is as futile as treating a fever while letting the underlying infection rage on.

In medicine there is a saying that underlines the importance of giving attention to the most pressing problems first, "Treat first, what kills first". We have chosen to focus on Palestine because it is according to every objective metric the most devastating attack we have witnessed in our lifetime. More than 90% of the population has been chased from their houses; Gaza is 3 times smaller than Hiroshima, but the equivalent of more than 8 atomic bombs have been dropped; more journalists have been killed than ever reported during a conflict; every single university has been completely destroyed; 80% of the global famine is currently in Gaza; More healthcare workers have been killed by the Israel army than all the conflict in the world combined from the past 5 years; in the history of mankind there has never been a war recorded with so many child amputees. 

Contrary to other conflicts or groups that also cause human rights violations, our governments and institutions are financially, military and politically supporting, rather than sanctioning, the blatant and unprecedented human rights violations committed by Israel.

On the 27th of January 2024, the ICJ declared that there is a risk of genocide, both due to the policies being enacted by the Israeli military and the genocidal statements by Israeli lawmakers and leaders.

Since then, the following people or institutions have termed the situation in Gaza a genocide:  the University Network for Human Rights (to which legal scholars from Yale, Boston Law and Cornell, among others, have contributed); The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention; Amos Goldberg, an Israeli professor of holocaust history at Hebrew University; Raz Segal, program director of genocide studies at Stockholm University, calls it a "text-book" genocide; Judge White of the District Court of California speaks of a "genocide in progress"; the UN report "Anatomy of a genocide" finds that the criteria of genocide are met; REcently a UN Special Committe confirmed that Israel;'s warfare methode are consistent with genocide.

Amnesty International has analysed Israel’s intent to create and maintain a system of oppression and domination over Palestinians and examined its key components: territorial fragmentation; segregation and control; dispossession of land and property; and denial of economic and social rights. It has concluded that this system amounts to apartheid. 

This analysis has recently been confirmed by the International Court of Justice which "has found multiple and serious international law violations by Israel towards Palestinians in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including, for the first time, finding Israel responsible for apartheid. The court has placed responsibility with all states and the United Nations to end these violations of international law."

It is easy to be tempted to turn away in despair when you see all the horrors and the scale of what is going on. To feel like this is beyond you and you cannot make a difference anyway.  

At Care for Palestine, we want to focus on the part we CAN influence: challenging in court the financial support going towards fueling the occupation and war machine. You can help as a volunteer, by sharing our actions online or by financially contributing towards the (legal) actions.