“We die standing and will not kneel, and as I said: Nothing remains in the valley except its stones, and we are its stones.” The last tweet written by the captured doctor and then martyr Adnan Al-Bursh on November 21, 2023 on the X platform, received great resonance from his arrest until his martyrdom in the Israeli Ofer prison, so his phrase That the Gazans recovered it is strong evidence confirming its adherence to its humanitarian mission and healing all the wounded under the most dire circumstances.

On the second day of May of this year, the Palestinian Prisoner’s Club announced the martyrdom of Dr. Al-Bursh, even though he was declared a martyr as the Israeli occupation announced on April 19, 2024, which sparked the anger of the Palestinians and humanitarians, as they were waiting to hear the news of his release at the time of the announcement. Revealing the release of prisoners from time to time.

The voice and image of the martyr doctor were linked in the minds of those following the war on Gaza. Since the first day of the war, he did not hesitate to expose the brutality of the occupation through his interventions on Al-Qanoot TV, after he used to spend a few minutes between operations and follow up on the wounded from the orthopedic department of Al-Shifa Hospital.

Every television intervention by Dr. Al-Bursh was a message to the world about the situation in Gaza, and one of his most prominent interventions was the one in which he cried bitterly when he and a group of doctors were forced to leave the hospital, forced by the occupation soldiers. At that time, he told Aljazeera’s correspondent, saying: “By God, my sister, we left the hospital in pain.” But praise be to God, we fulfilled the mission and our reward is due to God.”

Because of his belief in his humanitarian work and treating the war-wounded, Al-Bursh did not surrender after his displacement from Al-Shifa Hospital, but rather continued to treat the injured in the Indonesian Hospital until the occupation bombed it, which forced him to flee for the third time to Al-Awda Hospital, from where he was arrested after the Israeli army stormed, and his fate was not known until the Club announced The Palestinian prisoner was martyred, and the occupation is still holding his body.

As with the complications of the war that has been going on for about eight months, Al-Bursh created a story of success and heroism that he wrote by moving from one hospital to another to treat the wounded under the weight of bombing and rocket fire. He treated the most complex medical cases with the simplest means available, and achieved great success. This is not the first time that Al-Bursh has recorded successes with the wounded. .

An image of Dr. Al-Bursh stuck in people’s minds at the time of the 2019 Return Marches. It was shared by social media pioneers to create a strong reaction, when he decided to take a break in his white coat, which was stained with blood, after he had performed about 28 continuous surgical operations.

What was mentioned was a summary of the life of a doctor who carried the highest meanings of humanity, moving between orthopedic departments in Gaza hospitals to achieve distinguished successes despite simple capabilities. In the following lines, we review the details of the life of a doctor who became an inspiration to the world’s doctors in humanity.

His birth was a doctor and his ending was a martyr

The character of the human doctor, who became famous throughout the world during wartime for his adherence to treating his patients under the most dangerous circumstances, is evidence that his life is not ordinary, but rather contains a lot of patience, diligence, and diligence until he achieved high ranks that distinguished him from the rest of his peers in the field of medicine.

The martyr doctor was born on September 17, 1974, and before he turned fifty, and more than four months after his arrest while working with a group of doctors in Al Awda Hospital in northern Gaza, he announced his martyrdom on April 19, 2024.

Throughout his life, he distinguished himself in the story of his scientific and professional struggle. He resisted the occupier like a fighter who carries a gun. He put his life in danger several times, and he did not care about the threats of the occupation. Even at the time of storming Al-Shifa Hospital, he answered the Israeli officer on the phone with emotional stability, without shaking, and told him that he would continue. He does his job and will not give up on his patients.

When the occupation soldiers stormed Al-Shifa Hospital and destroyed its courtyards and some of its buildings and medical equipment by targeting them with incendiary shells, then forced the medical teams and displaced people to leave south after arresting dozens of young medical personnel and displaced people.

Al-Bursh refused to move south and walked on foot for hours until he reached the Indonesian Hospital and began treating the wounded without taking a rest. He is well aware that the patients need him, as does his family, which is still in the north, even though he lost dozens of the children and women of his close family.

Today, Dr. Al-Bursh’s colleagues open funeral homes for him, whether those who attended school in Al-Fallujah School during the middle school period, or in high school from Halima Al-Saadia School, as well as his fellow Arab doctors abroad who mourned him greatly and paid great attention to the details of his sacrifices in order to help his patients. It was a class taught in a course. Medical ethics.

He obtained a bachelor’s degree from the Faculty of Medicine at Janš University in Romania, then specialized in orthopedic and joint surgery. He obtained the Jordanian Board and the Palestinian Board, then obtained a British fellowship in complex fracture surgery in London.

The skill and precision of Al-Bursh in surgery made him gain a great reputation throughout Palestine. He assumed the presidency of the orthopedic department at Al-Shifa Hospital, and remained one of its prestigious medical pillars. From there, from Al-Shifa Hospital, his fame began and hundreds of patients came to him, who preferred to have him operate on them instead of receiving treatment abroad.

Al-Bursh used to participate in treatment with his patients, when he prescribed them swimming as a treatment for arthritis, and he always surprised them early in the morning wearing his swimsuit, ready to compete in the open sea.

He also devoted a lot of time to his work and his patients, but he loved his family and tried to forget the pressure of work while he was among them, and spent his little time with them doing things he loved. He followed sports and encouraged local, Arab, and international teams, in addition to being the head of the medical department of the Palestinian Football Association.

He also participated with his children in the 2018-2019 peaceful return marches and national events out of his belief in his Palestinian cause and their right to participate.

Doctor Al-Bursh, who spent his life moving between the corridors of the orthopedic department at Al-Shifa Hospital, was trying to live like a normal human being. He was practicing his hobbies that took him to the world he loved, through the piano on which he played the “turquoises and clathums” he loved, as he used to say.

He also obtained a master’s degree in political science from Al-Azhar University, and at that time, when his colleagues asked him why you, a doctor, choose politics, his response at the time was simple and convincing: “I want to know how the political process occurs, just as I know the medical process,” which made him distinguished in speaking to the Arab and international press when reporting The truth and exposing the crimes of the Israeli occupation.

As soon as the doctor’s martyrdom was announced, and before that, his arrest, dozens of testimonies from Gazans poured in on social media platforms, telling of their positions with a doctor who did not spare them from giving them his advice, even after they recovered.

What happened with Al-Bursh in particular was a deliberate assassination, which came within the framework of a systematic targeting of doctors in Gaza and the health system, including the aggression launched by the occupation against Al-Shifa Hospital in particular, targeting their medical staff, and the subsequent complete destruction of the hospital, turning it into a cemetery where… He was martyred and hundreds were arrested there.

The occupation did not stop at arresting Al-Bursh, but continued its systematic operation to take revenge on him by bombing his family’s homes in the Jabalia Al-Balad area, killing about 70 members of his family and his uncles.

The appearance of Al-Bursh on television provoked the occupation, especially by revealing the weapons that warplanes were dropping to kill Gazans. It put him in the circle of targeting since the beginning of the war, as threats came directly to him on his phone. Then his house was bombed while he was besieged in Al-Shifa Hospital two days before the truce, and on the first day. After the truce, he went and inspected the rubble of his house. At that time, he was patient, repeating, “I will build something better than him. We are all sacrificed for Palestine.”

Testimonies document that he was deliberately targeted

In the stories of the martyrs, they always feel the impending doom, as those close to them recall signs that hint at the time of their departure. Doctor Hossam Al-Madhoun says that he was arrested with the martyr Al-Bursh before he was later released: “Before our arrest, Dr. Adnan Al-Bursh was next to me, and I whispered to him: Doctor, what are you ready for?” He replied: I survived the first time, but my feeling is that I will not do it this time. Let us visit the wounded.

Al-Madhoun added in his testimony: “This conversation took place between the walls of the stairs, considering that it was a safe area from the sniper’s bullets. We actually passed by the wounded and followed up on their conditions, and hours later we were arrested,” and he concluded: “Doctor Al-Bursh was a towering lion.”

It was clear to the Al-Bursh family that the occupation was targeting to arrest and assassinate their son, Doctor Adnan. As he told them, they were communicating with human rights centers and lawyers to check on Dr. Adnan, who had no news from him since the moment of his arrest, and the only news we received was “his news.”

“The Israeli forces were preventing any form of communication with Dr. Adnan, and we were not even allowed to bring lawyers into the prison,” he says.

He continues: “Five months of torture, and we know nothing about it, except through some of those who came out of detention and said that there were no doctors left in the investigation, except Dr. Adnan.”

Doctor Mounir ends his testimony by saying: “If the investigators had taken from him what they wanted, he would have been released, but Adnan is a stubborn person in his truth, and this is our promise to him and his steadfastness.”

One of the phrases that remained stuck in the minds of Gazans was when the doctor told Adnan on Al Jazeera in an interview with him, “We are selling our situation, protect our children.” What he said was evidence of the scale of the hideous massacres, where the bodies of children were subjected to abuse and mutilation.

It seems clear that what prompted the occupation to kill Doctor Al-Bursh is that he witnessed the weapons that the occupation used to target children and civilians.

“We will die standing and we will not kneel,” he kept repeating it until the last minute of his work when someone thought about pushing him to take a break. He made use of his profession to be one of the tools of his struggle and struggle against the Israeli occupation, to the point that since the second month of the war he brought his six children, who are: “Yazan is 16 years old.” Yamen, 12 years old, Tamim, 9 years old, Elaine, 7 years old, Rakan, 5 years old, and their youngest, Kenan, 3 years old.

Al-Bursh insisted on bandaging and resisting in the Gaza hospitals in order to treat the wounded, as he kept repeating: We will not leave except to heaven or to our homes with dignity.

With the killing of Al-Bursh, the death toll of medical personnel in Gaza rose to 492 since October 7, according to a statement by the Ministry of Health in the Strip.

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