Speaking at a press conference in Brussels, the MSF Southern Africa Regional Advocacy Coordinator accused EU member states of enabling mass killings by maintaining arms trade agreements, despite public condemnations of Israeli military actions.

“This is ethnic cleansing. This is genocide. And the EU is helping make it happen,” said Waterhouse. “They are sending the very weapons that are killing our patients, our colleagues and Palestinian civilians.”

Waterhouse said MSF’s presence on the ground in Gaza has given it direct insight into what she called a systematic campaign to make the territory uninhabitable. She described widespread, deliberate destruction of homes, hospitals, water systems, power grids and roads, all of which, she said, is being carried out by design, not as unintended consequences of war.

MSF has reported more than 50 incidents involving direct attacks on its medical convoys, ambulances, and facilities since the beginning of the conflict. The organisation has been displaced from its posts at least 18 times and warns that humanitarian workers are no longer safe in Gaza.

“The disregard for civilian life is total. International humanitarian law is being shredded,” Waterhouse added.

She also raised alarm over the current aid distribution system in Gaza, which MSF claims is being used as a political tool. According to Waterhouse, desperate civilians are being lured into dangerous areas in search of food and medical assistance, only to be exposed to gunfire and further violence. “Aid has been weaponised. It is being used to manipulate, not to help,” she said.

Waterhouse called on the EU use its political and economic leverage to force Israel to lift the siege, allow proper humanitarian access, and stop what she called the instrumentalisation of aid. She also urged EU states to facilitate urgent medical evacuations, saying over 13 000 people, including thousands of children, need treatment that cannot be provided inside Gaza.

Despite the EU’s capacity to act, only a few hundred injured Palestinians have been granted evacuation for medical care abroad, she said.
“Solidarity is not enough. The EU must stop arming this war and start upholding the humanitarian principles it claims to defend,” said Waterhouse.

Doctors Without Borders says it will continue its operations in Gaza but warns that conditions for both civilians and humanitarian workers are rapidly deteriorating.

--ChannelAfrica--