Palestinian children and the Doctor of the Poor

 

JEFFREY ST. CLAIR > 

+ On June 21, Israeli forces raided the home of Dr. Mazen Al-Rantisi. Rantisi is known throughout the West Bank as the Doctor of the Poor, nicknamed for the low-cost and often free medical care he provides Palestinians living in Ramallah. Rantisi was arrested and jailed in the notorious Ofer Prison after being indicted for chairing a non-profit health care service that had been banned by Israel. According to an account in Haaretz, the 71-year-old doctor was imprisoned in an overcrowded cell, tear-gassed and denied essential medications. Dr. Al-Rantisi told lawyers with the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel that he had been blindfolded and forced to walk bent over. He said that he and other detainees had been repeatedly beaten and tear-gassed by guards during raids on his prison cell. During the first 10 days of his confinement, Al-Rantisi was denied his prescribed medications and denied repeated requests to be evaluated by a doctor.

+ More than 300 Palestinian children in Gaza have been killed by Israeli forces in the 300 days since a ‘ceasefire’ went into effect on October 10, 2025.  UNICEF’s Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa, Edouard Beigbeder: “A ceasefire that leaves an average of one child dead each and every day is failing children. With hundreds more children injured, many severely, children in Gaza are still waiting for the end to the violence they were promised.”

+ Palestinians with cancer living in Gaza are dying at two-to-three times the rate before Israel’s genocidal invasion and destruction of the Strip’s health care system. An estimated 17,000 cancer patients in Gaza still have no access to chemotherapy or advanced care inside the Israeli-occupied enclave, according to a report in Reuters. There are at least 5,000 cancer patients in Gaza registered for emergency treatment abroad, but who the Israelis have not been permitted to leave. Many are just waiting to die.

+ The Times of Israel reported this week that at least 191 Palestinian children were being held in “administrative detention” in Israeli prisons in March 2026. This is an increase of 88 kids from 103 being locked up in January of 2025, according to data collected by Parents Against Child Detention.