MER-C Head Spills Challenges Faced as Medical Team Enters Gaza

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Chairman of the Presidium of the Indonesian Medical Emergency Rescue Committee (MER-C) Sarbini Abdul Murad revealed the challenges of sending a medical team to Gaza, Palestine amid Israel's attacks and strict blockade.

The 11-member team successfully arrived in Gaza on Monday, March 18, 2024, with help from the World Health Organization (WHO) to enter from Cairo, Egypt.

Before working together to send the medical team, WHO involved MER-C in several Emergency Medical Team (EMT) trainings in Jakarta. "That was the beginning of our meeting with WHO," Sarbini told Tempo after a press conference in Central Jakarta on Tuesday, March 19, 2024.

The meeting led to the departure to Gaza after MER-C told WHO that it had a medical mission in the enclave and had built a hospital there. The hospital in question is the Indonesia Hospital (RSI) in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza, which was built with donations from the Indonesian people.

WHO then involved MER-C in the effort to enter Gaza, Sarbini said. Representatives of other countries, such as Malaysia, Norway, and Germany, also departed. "Initially, we were not involved. Only in the last two months were we involved by WHO," he said.

Sarbini said MER-C has been trying to send a medical team to Gaza since the beginning of the Israeli attack in October 2023. He suspected the coordination with Israel to enter Gaza is made easier with the help of WHO as an international body.

Sarbini also said that MER-C had "always coordinated with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs" during the press conference.

To Tempo, he revealed that the most challenging part in trying to get the medical team to Gaza was the diplomacy aspect. "Diplomacy [in context of] permission from Israel. Indonesia has no diplomatic relations (with Israel)," he said.

The MER-C medical team had to wait a month in transit in Cairo to get permission to enter Gaza since Israel restricts access and made anyone trying to cross into the enclave go through a strict verification process. With the help of WHO, MER-C managed to pass the process.

However, Sarbini admitted that MER-C had no idea about what kind of lobbying done to allow the medical team into Gaza, including whether his side cooperated with Israel.

In early March, the Jewish Insider claimed that the Indonesian government was lobbying Israel for the evacuation of Indonesian citizens from Gaza. 

The foreign media also wrote that the cooperation channel "leaves the door open" for the possibility of Israel-Indonesia relations normalization, which they said had been delayed.

MER-C admitted they did not know much about it, although they did not dismiss any possibility. "Maybe," Sarbini said, answering whether last year's evacuation effort involved lobbying with Israel. He added that people couldn't enter and exit Gaza without Israel’s permission. "So it's called forced bargaining."

Those who want to get out of Gaza amid ongoing fighting must first have their names on a list. Eight out of ten Indonesians who live in Gaza and were evacuated last year are no exception.

To Sarbini's knowledge, the list must be made known by the Egyptian, Palestinian, and Israeli authorities. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs previously denied cooperation with Israel, saying Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi used her closeness to the Foreign Ministers of Qatar and Egypt to evacuate Indonesian citizens.

Representing MER-C, Sarbini refused to comment on the matter. "The important thing is that the volunteers are safe. We believe that Indonesia is not trying to have diplomatic relations [with Israel]," he said.

In Gaza, MER-C's medical team consists of two surgeons and eight nurses who are experts in anesthesia and surgery, and one who is in charge of logistics.

They departed from Indonesia to Egypt in stages about two to three weeks ago, Sarbini said - between late February and early March. Waiting for permission from Israel to cross into Gaza, the medics waited for varying lengths of time, from one to three weeks in a rented residence in Cairo. Sarbini revealed that one member of the team had to return to Indonesia from Egypt due to visa expiration.

The medical team was welcomed by Gaza’s Ministry of Health officials and two MER-C non-medical volunteers in Gaza, Fikri Rofiul Haq and Reza Aldilla Kurniawan.

As directed by WHO and the Gaza Ministry of Health, they will be in charge of handling the hospital crisis in southern Gaza for a minimum of two weeks to one month on an alternating basis. According to Sarbini, the team are not given permission to enter central or northern Gaza and will stay in Rafah.

With the entry of 11 health workers, the total number of MER-C volunteers in Gaza now rises to 13.

NABIILA AZZAHRA

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