MEDIA RELEASE
09 July 2026
The Jewish Council of Australia is calling on the Australian Government to publicly demand the immediate release of Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, the director of Gaza’s Kamal Adwan Hospital.
Earlier this week, his lawyer and the Israeli human rights organisation Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI) warned Dr. Abu Safiya’s life was in immediate danger in Israeli detention. The Jewish Council is extremely concerned for his safety and calls on the Australian Government to exert immediate pressure on Israel to ensure his release.
Dr Abu Safiya, a paediatrician, has been held without charge or trial since December 2024, when he was arrested during an Israeli military raid on his hospital in northern Gaza. He is one of at least 14 doctors from Gaza who have been detained by Israel for more than eighteen months without charge.
His lawyer, Nasser Odeh, visited Dr Abu Safiya on 2 July at the underground Rakefet interrogation facility inside Nitzan Prison, where he was transferred on 24 June. Mr Odeh reported that: “His physical and psychological state, the severe injuries visible on his body, and his personal testimony leave no room for doubt: his life is in immediate danger.”
Speaking in response to these developments, Jewish Council of Australia Executive Director Sarah Schwartz said:
“Dr Abu Safiya is a paediatrician who refused to abandon his patients as Gaza’s health system was decimated around him. He has now spent more than 18 months in Israeli detention without charge or trial, and his lawyer says he may not leave prison alive.
“The Australian Government must do all it can to ensure his immediate release and the release of all other healthcare professionals detained without charge.
“Jewish tradition teaches that every life is of infinite value. What is being described here, a doctor beaten daily in an underground cell and denied medical care, is a violation of that tradition and of the most basic protections of international law.
“Nothing about Dr Abu Safiya’s torture makes Jewish people anywhere safer. It is the ultimate desecration of Jewish values to hold civilians without charge and to harm and to hurt them too.
“The Australian Government has raised the treatment of detainees with Israel before but on this we have heard nothing.
“We call on the Foreign Minister and the Prime Minister to urgently and publicly call for Dr Abu Safiya’s immediate release. We call on them to demand independent medical care, and the release of the other Gaza health workers held without charge, today.”
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