Gaza Strip: Norway to Accept Patients

The announcement comes after the World Health Organization (WHO) together with the European Union said that nine thousand Palestinians need urgent medical evacuation by the end of 2024, amid a brutal Israeli offensive in Gaza.

On Thursday, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store confirmed that the Nordic country will accept and treat Palestinians injured as a result of the Israeli genocide in the Gaza Strip.

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Norway will participate in the international effort to help Palestinians in urgent need of hospital treatment, VG media reported.

The announcement comes after the World Health Organization (WHO) together with the European Union said that nine thousand Palestinians need urgent medical evacuation by the end of 2024, amid a brutal Israeli offensive in Gaza.

In addition, Norway will contribute to airlifting Palestinian patients to other countries.

In this way, we can contribute to helping many more people than we have the capacity to bring to Norway for treatment, Store told VG.

Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store confirmed Thursday that the Nordic country will accept and treat injured Palestinians from the #Gaza Strip, local media reported. pic.twitter.com/R78CreGDU7

— Al-Estiklal English (@alestiklalen) June 27, 2024

The government has decided that up to 20 patients with family members from Gaza can be flown to Norway for treatment in Norwegian hospitals, he said.

According to the Norwegian prime minister, the humanitarian situation in Gaza is catastrophic and its health system has collapsed.

Last month, Norway officially recognized Palestine as a state.

As early as December last year, health organizations and the UN warned that the health system in Gaza was in a state of serious disrepair.

Today, only 12 of Gaza’s 36 hospitals are partially operational, according to the latest reports.

Since then, more than 37,700 Palestinians have died in Gaza, most of them women and children, and more than 86,400 have been injured, according to local health authorities.

Nearly nine months after the Israeli war, vast areas of Gaza lie in ruins amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water and medicine.

Israel is accused of genocide before the International Court of Justice, which in its latest ruling ordered Tel Aviv to immediately halt its operation in the southern city of Rafah, where more than a million Palestinians had sought refuge from the war before it broke out.