CAIRO (AP) — Under Gaza’s ceasefire deal, Israel freed dozens of doctors, nurses, paramedics and other medical personnel seized during raids on hospitals. But more than 100 remain in Israeli prisons, including Dr. Hossam Abu Safiya, a hospital director who became the face of the struggle to keep treating patients under Israeli siege and bombardment.
Despite widespread calls for his release, Abu Safiya was not among the hundreds of Palestinian detainees and prisoners freed Monday in exchange for 20 hostages held by Hamas. Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, has been imprisoned without charge by Israel for nearly 10 months.
Health Workers Watch, which documents detentions from Gaza, said 55 medical workers — including 31 doctors and nurses — were on lists of detainees from Gaza being freed Monday, though it could not immediately be confirmed all were released. The group said at least 115 medical workers remain in custody, as well as the remains of four who died while in Israeli prisons, where rights groups and witnesses have reported frequent abuse.
West Bank Palestinians continue to be attacked, often fatally, by gangs of roaming aggressive Israeli settlers. The land generations of Palestinians call home is being stolen and built on by settlers:
Attacks by Israeli army, illegal settlers injure 36 in occupied West Bank
Journalists among the dozens of Palestinians wounded amid escalation in Israeli violence during olive harvest season.
Palestinians stand next to a burned vehicle after illegal Israeli settlers attacked olive pickers in the village of Beita, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank [Raneen Sawafta/Reuters]
By Farah Najjar and News Agencies Published On 10 Oct 202510 Oct 2025
At least 36 people, including journalists, were injured in attacks by Israeli military forces and illegal settlers in towns near Nablus in the occupied West Bank, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. In a statement on Friday, the ministry said two people were wounded by live fire, while many others were injured as a result of beatings and physical assaults.
Protections for Palestinians in the West Bank must surely be a priority, not an after thought.
The biggest impediment to peace between Israelis and Palestinians has little to do with Gaza
While the IDF regularly kills children in the West Bank, any kind of stabilization will be impossible
The mother of 10-year-old Mohammed Bahjat Al-Hallaq sits surrounded by relatives in the family home in the village of Al-Rihiyah, south of Hebron, on Oct. 16, after her son was killed by the Israeli army, according to local sources. Photo by Mosab Shawer/Middle East Images via AFP/Getty Images
The Gaza war may finally be over, and the idea of a Palestinian state has returned to the center of global discourse. But before it can become a reality, Palestinians will need to carry less suspicion and hatred toward Israel — which means Israel must give them fewer reasons to cultivate those reactions.
An investigation from last week by my former colleagues at The Associated Press helps show how distant we are from that outcome — not just in Gaza, but also in the West Bank.
The investigation found that, according to United Nations data that Israel does not dispute, live Israeli fire has killed at least 18 children under the age of 15 in the West Bank this year. It killed 29 children in 2023, and 23 in 2024.
Some were killed during Israeli military raids in crowded neighborhoods, others by sniper fire in calm areas. The army told the AP that its open-fire regulations prohibit deliberate targeting and that it had launched some investigations. But it did not say whether anyone had been punished. The families of the deceased children report receiving little information from the army about the circumstances of their deaths, or any consequences meted out in reaction to them.
UN rights office sounds alarm over ‘skyrocketing’ Israeli settler violence during olive harvest
Israeli settler violence and access restrictions prevented many olive farmers from harvesting their land. Two weeks into the start of the 2025 harvest, we have already seen severe attacks by armed settlers against Palestinians men, women, children, and foreign solidarity activists… Direct land destruction is escalating… New Israeli checkpoints and iron gates separated farmers from their farms, sometimes keeping farmers away until their crops failed.” – Ajith Sunghay, Head of @OHCHR_Palestine
Retired, living in the Scottish Borders after living most of my life in cities in England. I can now indulge my interest in all aspects of living close to nature in a wild landscape. I live on what was once the Iapetus Ocean which took millions of years to travel from the Southern Hemisphere to here in the Northern Hemisphere. That set me thinking and questioning and seeking answers.
In 1998 I co-wrote Millennium Countdown (US)/ A Business Guide to the Year 2000 (UK) see https://www.abebooks.co.uk/products/isbn/9780749427917
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