Every year on May 12th, International Nurses Day recognizes the dedication, compassion, and critical role nurses play in healthcare systems across the world. From overrun emergency rooms to makeshift clinics in disaster zones, nurses remain the first to arrive and the last to leave. They are the lifelines of care, the human touch in clinical systems, and the hands that hold us in our most vulnerable moments.
But in 2025, this day doesn’t just call for celebration. It demands attention. It demands outrage. And it demands that we tell the truth about what nurses are enduring right now in Gaza.
Nursing in the Line of Fire: Gaza's Medical Workers Under Attack
Since October 7, 2023, Israel’s military assault on Gaza has not only devastated neighborhoods — it has systematically targeted Gaza’s healthcare infrastructure. Hospitals have been bombed. Ambulances attacked. And medical professionals, including nurses, have been killed, detained, or disappeared.
As of May 2024, at least 500 healthcare workers in Gaza have been killed — including doctors, nurses, paramedics, and ambulance drivers. Many were on duty, some performing emergency surgeries, others trying to evacuate neonatal units as bombs dropped overhead.
These are not "collateral casualties." These are direct violations of international humanitarian law, which protects medical personnel in conflict zones. Yet, the global community has remained largely silent.
The Disappearance of Gaza’s Nurses and Doctors
Among those unlawfully detained by Israeli forces are nurses, doctors, and hospital staff. They were taken from medical facilities, while in uniform, while providing care.
• Dr. Hossam Abu Safiya, head of pediatrics at Kamal Adwan Hospital, was detained by Israeli forces in December 2023 during a raid. His current condition and whereabouts remain unknown.
• Dr. Adnan Al Bursh, a highly respected orthopedic surgeon and professor, was also abducted and later killed while in Israeli custody. He was raped to death in Ofer prison — an act that many human rights organizations are calling a war crime.
Other nurses and medical professionals remain imprisoned without charges or contact with their families — simply for choosing to stay with their patients rather than flee.
International Nurses Day Is Not Just About Celebration
While nurses around the world continue to face systemic underfunding, long hours, and mental health struggles — the nurses in Gaza are confronting all of that and the threat of being killed or imprisoned for doing their jobs.
This International Nurses Day, we honor:
• The nurse treating wounded children in a makeshift clinic under siege.
• The ICU nurse working a 72-hour shift in a collapsing hospital.
• The medical worker who stayed behind, knowing the cost.
Their courage transcends borders. Their stories must not be erased.
Care Is Not a Crime. Nursing Is Not Resistance — But It Is Defiant.
To provide care in the face of destruction is an act of defiance. It is the loudest refusal to let violence have the final word. And in Gaza, it is a form of resistance — not through arms, but through empathy. Through healing. Through holding lives together when everything else is falling apart.
We cannot allow the global narrative to turn International Nurses Day into hollow praise. Not when nurses are being killed and captured for doing what we claim to honor them for.
A Global Profession, A Global Responsibility
This day is for all nurses — from those in well-funded hospitals in Berlin and Toronto, to those performing surgery by flashlight in Rafah. But recognition means nothing if we ignore the nurses who will never see another May 12th because they were targeted for choosing to care.
To the nurses of the world:
We see you. We remember those we’ve lost. And we vow to speak the names of those still silenced.
How You Can Support:
• Share this post to spread awareness.
• Demand accountability for war crimes against healthcare workers.
• Support verified medical aid organizations operating in Gaza.
• Advocate for the release of detained nurses and medical professionals.
0 comments