A three-year-old Palestinian girl, Razan, has survived a bullet lodged in her neck after it ricocheted through her mother’s body. David Anderson, a UK government-sponsored medic from Rutland, who spent six months in war-torn Gaza as part of Britain’s humanitarian response, played a vital role in saving the girl’s life. While recounting his memories of Gaza, the 55-year-old said the horrors of war were unimaginable. Nevertheless, he added that the ceasefire which started on Sunday, while precarious, was a significant step forward.
The child Razan, has successfully had a 7.92mm bullet removed and is now recovering. Anderson, who was born in Scotland, revealed that it took three hours of surgery to remove the bullet precisely millimetres away from the little girl’s spinal cord. He stated that their story was heartbreaking, as they fled northern Gaza to what they thought was a safer location, only to end up displaced by war.
The Gaza conflict began when hundreds of Hamas fighters crossed Israel’s southern border on 7 October 2023, killing 1,200 and holding more than 250 hostages. In response, Israel launched a military campaign five days later, including a full-scale ground invasion on 27 October 2023, and more than 46,000 people have since been killed. The Israeli army said that their attacks were on Hamas fighters and that they tried to keep civilian casualties to a minimum.
Anderson, recognised in the King’s New Year’s Honours List with an OBE, played a critical part in the establishment of two emergency field hospitals in Al Mawasi and Deir El Balah. Funded by the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO), over 350,000 patients were treated in the two hospitals. The OBE recognised Anderson’s contribution to the UK’s emergency health response overseas, including Gaza, Lebanon, Ukraine, and the worst Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone in 2014
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