'Bread Not Bombs!': Doctors Against Genocide cry for Gaza at US Capitol

Doctors Against Genocide (DAG) visited Capitol Hill on Wednesday to advocate for immediate action to end the humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, Anadolu news agency reported.

DAG urged members of the Congress to demand an immediate and permanent ceasefire in the besieged enclave.

They also urged an end to the Israeli blockade and want humanitarian aid to enter Gaza, where Palestinians, including 1 million children, are facing starvation, disease and death.

The Israeli army renewed its assault on Gaza on 18 March, shattering a 19 January ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement with Hamas.

“Bread Not Bombs!”, “Let The Children Eat!” the doctors shouted at the Hart Building, while holding bread.

“The Israeli government’s deliberate malnutrition, starvation and attack on health care in Gaza has worsened and potentially portends extermination of masses of the Gaza population, particularly tens of thousands of children,” said Karameh Kuemmerle, a Boston-based pediatric neurologist.

Dr. Brennan Bollman, who just returned from Gaza, said there has been “zero aid and zero food” for eight weeks.

READ: WFP warns of deaths from hunger as Israel persists in blocking aid

“My Palestinian health care worker colleagues demonstrated something for which I have no word, because it goes beyond compassion, beyond skillful dedication, beyond courage.

“They lost their family members and returned to work the following day,” Bollman added.

She demanded an “immediate and permanent” ceasefire. “They need food, for their patients and for themselves; they need this illegal and unconscionable blockade to end.”

The UN World Food Programme announced last week that its food stocks in Gaza were completely depleted due to Israel’s blockade.

Gaza’s 2.4 million residents rely almost entirely on humanitarian aid, which has been cut off since Israel closed the Kerem Shalom, Zikim and Erez crossings on 2 March.

More than 52,300 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in a brutal Israeli onslaught since October 2023, most of them women and children.

The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants last November for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.