AMY GOODMAN: Razan was shot on the same day that the United States vetoed the U.N. Security Council resolution on protection of Palestinians. Your comments, Dr. Abbas?
DR. MEDHAT ABBAS: Well, I felt bad. Everybody -- I was shocked, really, because nothing -- we have just wanted nothing. The only thing that we need protection for our children, for our women, for our dignity, for our life, we need our freedom. That's all. And we have expected the United States to support us just not to die and to be free. But I don't know what happened. In fact, we cannot understand this. And really, we feel so bad for that.
AMY GOODMAN: Dalia al-Najjar, speaking to us from Istanbul, Turkey, where you work, co-founder of Xyla Water, where you're deeply dedicated to making clean water accessible around the world, can you comment on the accessibility of clean water in Gaza?
DALIA AL-NAJJAR: Ninety-seven percent of the water in Gaza is unfit for human consumption. So the water situation in Gaza is really horrible. And I'm exploring solutions and alternatives all the time to try to help, but it's impossible to do anything in Gaza without lifting the blockade and freeing the people and granting the freedom of movement and the people to be able to bring resources to build and to live normally, actually. I haven't seen my family in two years. And it's a really tough time right now, and I can't be there with them. And so, this is what we need to do. We need to, first of all, to lift the blockade, and then we will find solutions to everything else. Without lifting the blockade, it's really hard to navigate any solutions for all the problems that -- and the crisis that Gaza is suffering from.
AMY GOODMAN: And your thoughts on Razan being killed the day that the U.S. vetoed the U.N. Security Council resolution on protection of Palestinians?
DALIA AL-NAJJAR: It's really disappointing. The whole world is watching one country of occupation bullying everyone else, and no one is doing anything. It's such a shameful -- it's a shameful side that the United States decided to take. And it's really disappointing. And we wish that they would rethink this and would work toward justice, because peace will never emerge if we keep acting the way people act and the way the political leadership and the world acts. We need people to seek for justice, and this is how peace will be built.
AMY GOODMAN: And finally, Dr. Medhat Abbas, have Israeli doctors, Israeli hospitals reached out to Shifa -- your hospital is the largest medical facility in Gaza -- during this time? The director of the International Committee of the Red Cross has said the violence since the Great March of Return has "triggered a health crisis of unprecedented magnitude in this part of the world."
DR. MEDHAT ABBAS: Yeah, it's a big magnitude. But the problem, as I mentioned, the capacity that we have in our hospital is very limited, and we cannot handle those mounting numbers every Friday. It's a disaster. And I mentioned that on the 14th of May we were not able to handle most of the cases who were thrown on the ground because our -- all of the operation rooms were operating 'til next day morning and were not enough to meet the need of those bleeding victims outside. For that reason, it is still -- we are still appealing. And thanks for the ICRC and WHO. They have been supporting us strongly during those events. But, in fact, we have too much needs, which are not yet met because of lack of donors and shortage of funds arriving to Gaza during this crisis. And it was mentioned, we were disappointed. We still need support. We still need our freedom. We still need medications. And we need these borders, the sealed border, to be opened, for God's sake.
AMY GOODMAN: And have any Israeli hospitals or doctors reached out to you to help?
DR. MEDHAT ABBAS: Well, no. No. Sure, no. Not at all. But Palestinians from the West Bank have arrived. Jordan colleagues, they have arrived also, some vascular surgeons. But none of them have arrived to us, no.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you both very much for being with us, Dr. Medhat Abbas, director of the Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza, the largest medical facility there, and Dalia al-Najjar, Razan's cousin, co-founder of Xyla Water, an organization dedicated to making clean water accessible around the world. We will end with the last photograph of Razan, a photo moments before she was killed.
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