The gynecologist-obstetrician Zineb Elmzabri has returned from an international humanitarian mission recently conducted in the Gaza Strip with a team of practitioners and volunteers from various fields. As the first Moroccan female doctor to visit the region since October 7, 2023, she reports on a healthcare system that has been decimated and is struggling to treat patients and the injured who have fallen victim to the genocide. DR ‹ › Within the Moroccan Coordination of Doctors for Palestine, Dr. Zineb Elmzabri volunteered to join an international humanitarian mission in the Gaza Strip in December 2025. A few days after her return, the obstetrician-gynecologist shared with Yabiladi her experience of a decimated healthcare system, reflecting the dire conditions faced by the population since the start of the genocide on October 7, 2023. Working at the Sidi Hssain Bennaceur provincial hospital in Ouarzazate, she is the first among her peers in Morocco to have been able to travel to Gaza since the Israeli occupation's offensives began destroying homes, equipment, and essential services, while also cutting off access to humanitarian aid. From December 4 to 16, Dr. Zineb Elmzabri was deployed at Al Helou International Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip. She worked with the PalMed Foundation, which brings together numerous doctors in Europe to support their colleagues in Palestine through international missions providing direct aid, training, and the distribution of medical supplies. «Given the difficulties in accessing the region, the volunteer team was composed of two practitioners instead of four. I was deployed as an obstetrician-gynecologist, and my colleague, Dr. Abdelhai El Gamri, as a neurosurgeon. We were the only two Arab doctors, and the mission also included professionals of other nationalities and various specialties working through UNRWA and the Red Crescent,» she told us. A medical infrastructure reduced to ashes On the ground, the role of the two practitioners was crucial, vital, and complementary, especially as the United Nations has warned that healthcare services for mothers and newborns have been «decimated». According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), 94% of hospitals in the Gaza Strip have been destroyed or damaged, «depriving pregnant women of essential care». In total, more than 70,000 Palestinian civilians have been killed since October 7, 2023, with tens of thousands injured, in addition to those missing. «Medically, we know that a woman's psychological state becomes particularly fragile during pregnancy. Experiencing this in wartime greatly increases vulnerability. Patients are even more affected by famine, malnutrition, and the deaths and injuries affecting entire families», Dr. Elmzabri confided to us, after first being received by the director of Al-Shifa Hospital before joining the maternity ward at Al Helou. «Until now, Al Helou was a private establishment. But it is important to understand that, with most of the public healthcare system ravaged by the genocide and its consequences, especially in northern Gaza, the facility is now largely mobilized to serve the public sector, like many others», the doctor explained. After working for a long time on half salaries, Palestinian doctors «now practice there without any pay, as the resources of their supervising ministry have been exhausted». «Like the rest of the population, they live in tents with their families and children, showing exemplary courage in fulfilling their mission day after day», Dr. Elmzabri added. On site, she performed cesarean sections and gynecological surgeries, while managing complicated deliveries. She told Yabiladi that she was particularly moved by the patients' stories and their living conditions. «Every story leads to another, and all are important to tell. Among them, I remember a patient suffering from cervical cancer who had a young daughter. At a very advanced stage of her illness, she had lost all her loved ones since the start of the attacks. She remained the sole anchor for her child. She placed her hope in the effectiveness of surgery after chemotherapy, but the protocol did not improve her condition». Rebuilding the healthcare system to protect human dignity From this mission, the doctor retains «the courage and selflessness of an entire people convinced of the justice of their cause and deserving of respect, so much so that volunteers inevitably question their own daily concerns outside a context of war». «One does not emerge unscathed from such an experience, which teaches us a great deal about ourselves and about the importance of placing our human commitment above all other considerations», she confided. Zineb Elmzabri also highlighted «the daily suffering of both the population and healthcare workers, who fall and rise again while facing death every day». This reality, she said, leads volunteers «to double their determination during the humanitarian mission and even after it ends». «Among the cases that deeply affected me was that of a fellow Palestinian gynecologist who was injured during the attacks. After spending two months in intensive care, she resumed her medical duties immediately upon discharge, without recovery time», she told us. «All of this happens while more than 90% of hospitals in the Gaza Strip have been attacked since October 2023, meaning that many doctors no longer even have a place to work», Dr. Elmzabri stressed, adding that «the women's health unit where the mission was deployed has been hit and rebuilt several times since then». On site, «there are now only two operating blocks for all specialties, which severely limits surgical care due to the lack, or total absence, of certain specialties». «As for the pediatric hospital, it has been reduced to just two rooms. Diagnoses are increasingly difficult, especially with MRI and CT scanners damaged, and with medical supplies and equipment running dangerously low», she noted. She also pointed to the soaring cost of living faced by civilians in Gaza, including medical staff. Emphasizing the solidarity among healthcare professionals despite the hardships, she recalled that «some doctors have buried their children and returned to work without observing days of mourning, simply to ensure continuity of care». For Dr. Elmzabri, these realities reinforce «the responsibility of every healthcare professional, man or woman, to remain on the front line in the service of others», as well as «the responsibility of the international community to put an end to the genocide» and to help rebuild the region, starting with its healthcare system.
