{"id":573776,"date":"2026-07-29T12:34:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T12:34:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/573776\/"},"modified":"2026-07-29T12:34:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T12:34:12","slug":"israel-targeting-hospitals-and-doctors-in-palestine-part-of-the-genocide-helen-mcentee-told","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/573776\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel targeting hospitals and doctors in Palestine ‘part of the genocide’, Helen McEntee told"},"content":{"rendered":"

As they handed in a letter to Government Buildings for foreign affairs minister Helen McEntee, Irish Health Care Workers for Palestine called for Ireland to ensure the EU-Israel Association is suspended during its six-month EU presidency<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The EU-Israel Association<\/a> is the framework which governs trade, economic co-operation, and political dialogue between the two regions. The Irish Government has consistently called for the EU to suspend this agreement.<\/p>\n

Irish Health Care Workers for Palestine told Ms McEntee they were calling upon her to \u201crespond to the situation of Palestinian healthcare professionals from Gaza who have been arrested and detained in Israeli prisons and insist that their detention and treatment is reviewed immediately by the EU\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"OneOne of the cases raised in the Irish healthcare workers’ letter is that of Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, who was arrested by the Israeli army in December 2024. Picture: Front Line Defenders<\/p>\n

The group expressed its \u201cdeepest concerns regarding the use of arbitrary detention, torture, and other cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment inflicted upon them\u201d. <\/p>\n

It raised the cases of Dr Adnan Al Bursh, head of orthopaedic surgery at Al-Shifa Hospital, who died in an Israeli prison in April 2024, and Dr Hussam Abu Safiya<\/a>, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, who was arrested by the Israeli army in December 2024.<\/p>\n

Amnesty International has said Dr Abu Safiya is being detained \u201cwithout charges or trial\u201d under Israel\u2019s Unlawful Combatants\u2019 Law.<\/p>\n

He is one of 83 Palestinian healthcare professionals who were detained in April 2026, according to Healthcare Workers Watch. Some six healthcare workers have died in detention.<\/p>\n

\"AlsoAlso today, Sean Marmion and Helen Mahony of the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign, and Amnesty International Ireland director Stephen Bowen were at Government Buildings where they handed in a letter protesting the Central Bank\u2019s involvement in the sale of Israeli bonds. Picture: Conor \u00d3 Mear\u00e1in\/Collins\u00a0<\/p>\n

In their letter to Ms McEntee, Irish Health Care Workers for Palestine called on her to \u201clead the suspension of the EU-Israel Association Agreement\u201d.<\/p>\n

Dr Aoife Twohig told the Irish Examiner that the letter was being presented in \u201csolidarity with all healthcare workers\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s actually part of the genocide to destroy the healthcare system, to take away the very people who can actually support the Palestinian people in their recovery,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cActually, we see this very much [as part of] the approach that the Israeli government has taken.<\/p>\n

\"KamalKamal Adwan Hospital director Dr Hussam Abu Safiya walking towards Israeli army tanks prior to his arrest in 2024. Picture: @muhannad_almuqayed<\/p>\n

At Farmleigh House, meanwhile, German chancellor Friedrich Merz told reporters following a meeting with Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin that he believes that \u201cgeneral sanctions against Israel are the wrong way forward\u201d.<\/p>\n

He acknowledged that Ireland and Germany are at odds on this, but that Germany has a \u201cspecial relation to the state of Israel\u201d and \u201cwill not join sanctions against Israel\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe don’t want to. We won’t do it. We cannot do it, and this will continue to be the case for the time being,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

The Taoiseach branded recent \u201cviolent attacks\u201d on schools and farming communities in the West Bank as \u201coutrageous\u201d.<\/p>\n

Louise Burne, Political Correspondent<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As they handed in a letter to Government Buildings for foreign affairs minister Helen McEntee, Irish Health Care…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":573777,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[4712,74289,103,397,396,61,60,1196],"class_list":["post-573776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-israel-palestine","tag-eu-presidency","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-middle-east"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573776"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573776\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/573777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}