Palestinian Health Minister Urges U.S. Intervention for Rafah Crossing

The Palestinian health minister, Majed Abu Ramadan, appealed to the United States to pressure Israel to reopen the Rafah crossing for humanitarian aid. The closure has severely hindered essential medical supply deliveries to Gaza, exacerbating a catastrophic health crisis. Abu Ramadan called for international intervention, emphasizing immediate action.

The Palestinian health minister on Wednesday urged the United States to pressure Israel to open the Rafah crossing to humanitarian aid, saying there was no indication that Israeli authorities would do so soon. Rafah was a major entry point for humanitarian relief before Israel stepped up its military offensive on the Gaza side of the border earlier this month and seized control of the crossing from the Palestinian side.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that its closure has significantly affected its ability to deliver essential medical supplies into the Gaza Strip, which has been targeted by an Israeli offensive since the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas in southern Israel. "There is no indication when they want to open it," the Palestinian minister, Majed Abu Ramadan, told reporters on the sidelines of the World Health Assembly in Geneva.

"However, I would expect that all our friends and the international community to press hard, and especially the United States of America, they have to press hard in order to open that." Abu Ramadan said the crossing's closure "complicates the situation", making it "really very, very catastrophic".

Israel sent its tanks into Rafah for the first time on Tuesday, despite an order from the International Court of Justice to end its attacks on the city. Around one million people have fled the Gazan city in the past three weeks to take refuge from bombardment across the densely populated enclave, according to the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA).

"Regarding the health sector, more than 80% of our structures were wiped out, destroyed either totally or partially, including hospitals, nurseries, primary health care," Abu Ramadan said. "Patients of cancer and blood diseases are dying because they cannot get their chemotherapy, and they cannot go out for radiotherapy. Many people lost their limbs, one or more, unnecessarily because there is no facility to treat them or the equipment."