The healthcare system in Gaza is collapsing under the weight of Israel’s total blockade and unrelenting bombardment, as hospitals run out of fuel, medicine, and hope.

This week marked a devastating milestone: the last dialysis machines at Al-Shifa Medical Complex—Gaza’s largest hospital—were forced to shut down, sealing the fate of hundreds of chronically ill Palestinians.

With no fuel allowed into the besieged Strip, dialysis machines fell silent. Over 400 kidney patients have already died—not from war wounds, but from a slow, calculated deprivation. They were killed by a policy that blocks aid, starves hospitals of resources, and refuses the most basic humanitarian access.

“This is not a failure of logistics—it is a weaponization of healthcare,” said a spokesperson for the Gaza Ministry of Health. “It is a systematic campaign to strangle life itself in Gaza.”

Once a symbol of endurance, Al-Shifa now echoes with abandonment. The Ministry of Health warns that unless fuel and supplies are immediately delivered, thousands more—patients and wounded alike—will face death not by bombs, but by a cruel strategy of medical suffocation.

The World Health Organization has sounded the alarm, citing the total collapse of kidney care and the exhaustion of vital medications. UNRWA has described the blockade as "medical asphyxiation," laying blame on Israeli policies that deliberately obstruct lifesaving aid.

Last month, Israeli forces destroyed the Noura al-Kaabi Dialysis Center in northern Gaza. The facility, part of the Indonesian Hospital network, had provided critical care before being reduced to rubble. According to Gaza health authorities, this destruction is part of a larger strategy to empty northern Gaza of hospitals and specialized medical care, depriving an entire population of their right to life.

While the international community watches, Gaza’s chronically ill are dying in silence. The call from health officials is urgent and unwavering: without immediate international intervention, Gaza’s hospitals will become mass graves—not from war injuries, but from cold, calculated neglect. (ILKHA)