28 February 2025
Chronology of Dr Hussam Abu Safiya
Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, a Palestinian paediatrician and director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, was arrested on 27 December 2024 after refusing to abandon his patients. He has since endured torture, starvation, and indefinite detention without charge. This chronology outlines key events in his life and imprisonment, including the killing of his son by an Israeli sniper, his mother’s fatal heart attack after his arrest, and international calls for his release.
Dr Hussam Idris Abu Safiya was born on 21 November 1973 in the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza. His family had been displaced from the town of Hamama in the Ashkelon district during the 1948 Nakba. He completed his early education in Gaza before moving to Kazakhstan, then part of the Soviet Union, to pursue medical studies. During his time there, he met Albina Abu Safiya, a Kazakh/Russian national, whom he later married. After earning his medical degree in the mid-1990s, he returned to Gaza in 1996 with his wife to begin his medical career.
Upon his return, he began working under the Gaza Ministry of Health as a paediatric physician. Over the years, he became known for his expertise in neonatology and paediatric care, eventually obtaining a master’s degree and passing the Palestinian board certification in these specialities. His skills and dedication led him to take on increasing responsibilities within Gaza’s healthcare system. He worked in multiple hospitals before eventually becoming head of the paediatric department at Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza, a position in which he oversaw critical care for infants and children.
Throughout his career, Dr Abu Safiya played a key role in expanding paediatric and neonatal services in Gaza, particularly at Kamal Adwan Hospital, which serves a large population in the northern region. His work included securing ventilators, incubators, and medicine for newborns and children with chronic illnesses. He also worked with MedGlobal, an international medical organisation, providing humanitarian healthcare in Gaza.
On 7 October 2023, the war in Gaza erupted, and Dr Abu Safiya, as the head of Kamal Adwan Hospital’s paediatric department, found himself at the centre of a humanitarian crisis. With hospitals overwhelmed, supply lines cut off, and thousands of casualties pouring in, he refused to leave his post. Kamal Adwan became one of the last functioning hospitals in northern Gaza, and he worked tirelessly to keep it operational. His own family moved into the hospital with him for safety. Over time, he managed to increase the hospital’s capacity from 120 to 200 beds to accommodate the wounded.
As Israeli bombardments intensified, the hospital became a refuge for displaced families and the wounded. Dr Abu Safiya gave repeated warnings to international media and humanitarian organisations about the deteriorating conditions. He publicly called for medical aid, warning of starvation and disease spreading among children due to the siege on northern Gaza. He documented cases of infants dying due to a lack of milk and essential medicine. In one statement to Human Rights Watch in April 2024, he reported that 26 children had died in Kamal Adwan Hospital alone due to malnutrition and starvation-related complications.
Kamal Adwan Hospital was subjected to repeated Israeli military attacks and sieges. The first major raid took place in December 2023, with another following in May 2024. By October 2024, the hospital was under near-constant bombardment. Despite warnings from the Israeli military to evacuate, Dr Abu Safiya refused to leave, stating that abandoning his patients was not an option. On 25 October 2024, Israeli forces surrounded and stormed the hospital. Hundreds of people, including hospital staff, were detained. He was interrogated and briefly detained before being released back into the hospital.
On the same day, an Israeli sniper shot and killed his 15-year-old son, Ibrahim, at the hospital gates. Dr Abu Safiya described this as a deliberate act of retaliation against him for refusing to evacuate. Despite his grief, he continued his work at the hospital, leading funeral prayers for his son in the courtyard before returning to treat patients.
Dr Abu Safiya’s appointment as director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in February 2024 came after his predecessor, Dr Ahmed al-Kahlout, was detained, tortured, and later killed by Israeli forces. Dr al-Kahlout was arrested in December 2023 during an Israeli military raid on the hospital and was later forced to make a false confession under torture, in which he was filmed claiming that Kamal Adwan Hospital was being used for military purposes. His colleagues and human rights organisations rejected these statements as being coerced under duress, a known Israeli interrogation tactic against Palestinian prisoners. Gaza’s Health Ministry, Palestinian human rights groups, and the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) all condemned the treatment of Dr al-Kahlout, rejecting Israel’s claims as unreliable and extracted under torture. Despite this, Israeli forces assassinated Dr al-Kahlout on 29 November 2024, when an Israeli drone strike targeted and killed him as he passed through the hospital gate. His murder demonstrated a deliberate Israeli policy of executing Palestinian medical professionals who refuse to abandon their duty.
After Israeli forces withdrew from the hospital on 28 October, the bombardment of Kamal Adwan Hospital continued. Israeli troops repeatedly shelled the facility, and by November, snipers had begun targeting the building. On 23 November 2024, Dr Abu Safiya was severely injured by shrapnel when a quadcopter drone strike hit the hospital compound. Despite suffering multiple wounds to his leg, he insisted on continuing his work, vowing to remain with his patients.
On 27 December, Israeli forces launched a final raid on Kamal Adwan Hospital, surrounding it and forcing all remaining patients, staff, and displaced civilians to evacuate. They detained approximately 350 people, including Dr Abu Safiya. In footage from that day, he was seen calmly walking towards an Israeli tank, shaking hands with a soldier, and informing them that there were no remaining patients or staff inside before being taken away. Witnesses later reported that he had refused to leave the hospital until he ensured that all patients and medical personnel had been safely evacuated.
After his arrest, he was taken to the Sde Teiman detention facility in the Negev desert, a site notorious for the torture and abuse of Palestinian detainees. Shortly after learning of his detention, his mother, Samiha Abu Safiya, suffered a fatal heart attack. The psychological toll of his imprisonment on his family came just weeks after the killing of his son. For weeks, no information was provided about his whereabouts. It was only after increasing pressure from human rights organisations that Israeli authorities confirmed they were holding him. He was later transferred to Ofer Prison in the West Bank.
During his detention, multiple human rights organisations documented severe acts of torture and inhumane treatment inflicted upon Dr Abu Safiya. Front Line Defenders, Amnesty International, and Al Jazeera all reported that he had been subjected to beatings with batons, electric shocks, forced stress positions, and prolonged shackling. He was forcibly stripped, denied medical care, and only given one meal per day, causing severe weight loss and a worsening of his chronic hypertension. On 11 February 2025, after 47 days in detention, he was finally allowed to meet a lawyer from the Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights, where he provided a firsthand account of the brutality he endured.
In mid-February 2025, Israeli Channel 13 broadcast footage of Dr Abu Safiya in Ofer Prison, showing him visibly exhausted, severely underweight, and shackled while being interrogated and manhandled by armed guards. The footage sparked outrage, with his family calling it an act of psychological warfare. Holocaust survivors and scholars also condemned the attack on medical professionals, with Dr Gabor Maté drawing historical parallels and Elise Tak, the daughter of Holocaust survivors, denouncing the targeting of doctors as a war crime.
As of the latest updates, Dr Hussam Abu Safiya remains imprisoned, enduring indefinite detention and abuse. His last recorded public statement before his arrest was a vow that he would never abandon his patients, declaring, “My profession is my duty, and I must continue with it. I will stay inside the hospital until the last moment.”