American Doctors Volunteering In Gaza Ask Why So Many Children Have Headshot Wounds
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called Israel the "most moral army in the world," but a high volume of deeply troubling wounds seen by American surgeons volunteering in Gaza is casting doubt on that claim.
Dr. Mark Perlmutter, an American surgeon with heavy catastrophe-zone experience, is among those stunned by the civilian devastation they've recently witnessed in Gaza, and especially by a high volume of what appear to be precision rifle-fire wounds on children - including toddlers.
"All of the disasters I've seen, combined – 40 mission trips, 30 years, Ground Zero, earthquakes, all of that combined – doesn't equal the level of carnage that I saw against civilians in just my first week in Gaza," Dr. Mark Perlmutter, an orthopedic surgeon and vice president of the International College of Surgeons, told CBS's Sunday Morning.
What most struck him was his observation that the overwhelming majority of the patients he and his team treated were children:
"I've never seen that before. I've seen more incinerated children than I've ever seen in my entire life, combined. I've seen more shredded children in just the first week … missing body parts, being crushed by buildings, the greatest majority, or bomb explosions, the next greatest majority."
"I have two children that I have photographs of that were shot so perfectly in the chest, I couldn't put my stethoscope over their heart more accurately, and directly on the side of the head, in the same child. No toddler gets shot twice by mistake by the 'world's best sniper.' And they're dead-center shots."
A Virginia anesthesiologist said he saw an estimated 30 single gunshot wounds to children in just two weeks. A doctor based in gunfire-heavy Chicago described the horrific conclusion he reached as the pattern emerged on the treatment tables in front of him:
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