WORLD ISLAMIC HEALTH UNION, WIHU’23, ALGERIA CONGRESS
8. WORLD ISLAMIC HEALTH SHOURA
FINAL DECLARATION
Dear participants
May Allah’s peace, mercy and blessings be upon us…
We are honored and delighted to hold our World Islamic Health Union 2023 Congress in Algeria between 14-16 December 2023. On this occasion, I would like to express my gratitude to the President of Algeria, Mr. Abdel Majid Tebbun, for his support to our congress.
I would like to express my respect and affection to the members of the host Najda Association, especially its president Dr. Muhammad Gharbi. From Turkey, I bring the blessings of our president Mr. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the greetings of the Turkish people.
Unfortunately, we are holding this congress with great sadness. Hundreds of people are being massacred every day in Gaza and all over Palestine, women, children and the elderly. Israel bombards houses, health facilities, places of worship, ambulances and throws patients out of hospitals. Hospitals and health institutions are deprived of medicine and medical supplies, and people are exiled in hunger and poverty.
As Muslim doctors and medical personnel, we strongly condemn this situation and the Israeli atrocities and call on international organizations to stop and hold Israel accountable for its crimes against humanity. Israel shoots hospitals and ambulances, disregarding the laws of war in the history of the world, and prevents the treatment of the sick and the useful. Israel and its supporters will never escape responsibility for these crimes against humanity.
The main purpose of the establishment of the World Islamic Health Union is the Palestinian cause. Palestine and Gaza have been the battleground of the struggle between right and wrong since Talut and Goliath. For the last 75 years, the region has been plagued by cruelty, torture and massacre. In 2010, during the Israeli attacks on Gaza, the delegation of the Arab Doctors Association, which we met in Cairo on our return from Gaza, where we went as Sağlık-Der team, shared with us that Muslims could not help sufficiently and effectively due to their dispersed state and that there was a great need for a worldwide structure to coordinate such organizations. As an individual raised by Prof. Dr. Necmettin Erbakan to be the standard-bearer of the Muslims of the world, they had expressed that a structure should be established under the leadership of Dr. Kasım Sezen and that they would also support it. As a result of consultations with the late Necmettin Erbakan and our President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan upon his return to Turkey, the World Islamic Health Union was established in 2016 with the participation of 400 delegates from 65 countries of the world and is currently active in 96 countries.
We are rushing to the aid of the oppressed Palestinian people in the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli war, and we know that doctors, health personnel and human rights defenders all over the Islamic world desire to save a life in Gaza and Palestine.
We express that we stand by our Palestinian brothers and sisters with all our means, materially and spiritually, in accordance with the words of the Prophet (PBUH) “If you see an evil, correct it with your hands, if you are unable to do so, correct it with your tongue, and if you are unable to do so, hate it with your heart” and we are waiting ready to enter Gaza if the Egyptian government allows entry through the Rafah gate.
In hospitals without energy and fuel, with limited medical supplies/devices, under bombardments, in hospitals where essential needs, including water and food, were not met, surgeries were performed without anesthesia, and most recently, a new war crime that will never be forgiven was committed when babies in incubators were separated from their respirators due to power and oxygen cuts. Ambulances were bombed and civilians were condemned to die on the spot. The ‘white flag’ physicians and heroic auxiliary health personnel, who carried out the honorable duty of medicine and heroically practiced their profession, were also affected by this barbarism and hundreds of casualties were suffered. We send our greetings and prayers to all these heroic colleagues. On the other hand, we are ashamed that 100 Israeli doctors who wanted hospitals in Gaza to be blown up are our colleagues.
In Gaza, which has been devastated by thousands of bombs, including phosphorus bombs, people and other living beings are dying under the rubble without being rescued, and the bodies of the martyred are not even allowed to be collected. People are prevented from accessing water, electricity and food, and aid trucks sent from other countries are kept waiting at the border. The chief physician of the hospital reported that stray animals attacked the bodies in the region where waste water mixes with the streets. Dangers such as the risk of infectious diseases and attacks by the occupying Israeli soldiers await the people of Gaza on the roads where a million people are forced to migrate. The genocide seen in history in Nazi Germany is practiced by the occupying Israel with different methods.
Whatever the reason, these crimes against humanity cannot be forgiven both in the public conscience and according to the rules of the law of war. No justification can justify this genocide. As WIHU sensitive physicians, we support the dignified resistance of the Palestinian people and invite the whole world to take a conscientious stance. On the basis of our mission to protect the sanctity of human life, we will not remain silent about this atrocity and we will continue to shout that when even one human being is killed, all humanity is killed.
With this feeling and motivation, we would like to emphasize the following points at the 8th World Islamic Health Council:
1) The Islamic World should mobilize all its power and send a comprehensive humanitarian and medical aid to Gaza urgently.
2)The worldwide boycott of Jewish capital has largely achieved its goal and dealt a serious blow to Zionist capital. This boycott should continue, no Muslim should be allowed to buy products produced by Zionist groups and alternative products should be produced in cooperation with Islamic countries.
3) The mobilization of volunteer medical personnel initiated by the World Islamic Health Union should be expanded to cover the entire Islamic world and it should be ensured that the sick and wounded Palestinians are helped in a coordinated manner as soon as possible.
4) Efforts should be made to keep the genocide and attacks carried out by Israel since October 7 on the agenda of the world public opinion and to continue the aid activities continuously and structured according to the needs.
5) Contact should be made with the relevant authorities to take the necessary actions before international organizations to punish those who commit crimes against humanity. Whatever the reason, these crimes are never forgivable. As the World Islamic Health Union, we support the Palestinian resistance in its just cause and invite the whole world to take a conscientious stance.
6)We demand the protection of the right to life of Palestinian civilians, a ceasefire and cessation of hostilities through the effective implementation of the necessary sanctions, the opening of border crossings to ensure the supply of the necessary materials, and the treatment of the wounded on the spot if possible, if not, by transferring them to nearby countries.
7) We hope that the actions against genocide and massacres will be continued by all our colleagues regardless of country borders. As health volunteers, we are ready to fulfill our historical responsibilities.
As volunteers of the World Islamic Health Union, we would like to express that we are ready to take all the steps that fall on us for this purpose without delay. It is unacceptable that hospitals, patients and health personnel, which have immunity even in times of war, are subjected to attacks!
As the World Islamic Health Union, with the awareness of the responsibility that history has placed on our shoulders, it is not possible for us to remain silent about the “genocide” that has been going on for years in Gaza, the land of Palestine, in a nearby geography.
We wish Allah’s mercy to all health workers and our Palestinian brothers and sisters who lost their lives in the attacks and patience to their relatives. We wish a speedy recovery to the wounded. We do not accept the bombing of health institutions and the killing of patients, wounded and health personnel for any reason whatsoever, and we hope that these massacres by Israel will end as soon as possible.
We expect all countries of conscience to take the necessary measures to end these massacres as soon as possible. We expect all health workers, medical faculties, the world health organization, human rights defenders and all societies of conscience to impose the necessary sanctions on Israel to stop these barbaric massacres.
With these feelings, I greet you all with the most sincere feelings and wish our congress to be auspicious.
