Caritas Jerusalem Participates in Steering Committee Meeting for AECID-Funded Development Project in Bethlehem
July 18, 2025
Following last Sunday’s evacuation of our main medical point in the Al-Bourka area of Deir al-Balah—Caritas Jerusalem’s primary humanitarian hub in the south of Gaza, where polio vaccinations were recently facilitated—we regret to report that the centre sustained some serious damage in the last days amid intensified bombing and ground incursions.
As mentioned in our previous newsflash, our team had pre-emptively relocated critical medical supplies to our medical point in Al-Nuseirat Camp after receiving an urgent displacement order last week. Despite this precaution, we were informed that bombing in the area escalated rapidly. Soon after, buildings surrounding the medical point were flattened, and the centre itself sustained structural damage. According to our staff, Israeli tanks and bulldozers razed the entire vicinity, including trees, buildings, and all surrounding infrastructure.
It must be emphasized: our colleagues in Gaza are no different from the rest of the civilian population. They are being starved under siege conditions, surviving on little more than salt, water, and tea.
Yesterday, Dr Jihad, our medical consultant in Gaza, witnessed a deeply distressing scene: an injured child awaiting surgery was crying uncontrollably. The doctors initially believed he was scared—but it became clear he was crying out of hunger.
This is the heart-breaking reality in Gaza.
We at Caritas Jerusalem are doing everything we can to stand by our colleagues and the people of Gaza, even though we feel helpless—crippled by the scale of suffering and the heart-breaking reality that we cannot reach them in the way they need us most.
“In a heart-breaking reflection shared by one of our colleagues in Gaza, they remarked with bitter irony:
‘Those who died at the beginning of the war are, in a way, the lucky ones. At least they were spared the slow, humiliating death by hunger that we are now left to endure.’
“We urgently appeal to President Trump to intervene and help bring an end to this brutal war,” said Anton Asfar, Secretary General of Caritas Jerusalem. “We plead for the immediate opening of humanitarian corridors, so we can reach thousands of innocent lives— among them our own colleagues in Gaza—before it’s too late.” End.
