'Heartbreaking' A British doctor on the pain of working in Gaza

Every day between 4am and 6am, Graeme Groom, an orthopaedic surgeon from London, would be woken by a dawn chorus of bombs and missiles.

- Jennifer Rankin

And so began another 24 hours at the Nasser hospital in Gaza, the largest functioning hospital in the territory. Shortly after 8am, the first patients of the day would be wheeled into the operating theatres.

Groom and his orthopaedic and plastic surgery colleagues saw on average 20 patients a day: one-third children, one-third women, then men of all ages, their limbs mangled by bombs and guns.

Groom, a co-founder of the charity Ideals, which provides health services in places affected by conflict, has been to Gaza about 40 times, including four visits since Hamas militants attacked Israel on 7 October 2023. One evening on his latest trip, just as the 12-hour-plus shift was ending, another emergency was wheeled in.

It was an 11-year-old boy who had lost his nine siblings in an Israeli strike on their family home in Khan Younis. His father, a doctor, was in a critical condition, and later died of his injuries. That night Groom and his team managed to save the boy's arm, rather than amputate it. The boy's name was Adam al-Najjar. As Adam got better, the NHS doctor found that Adam spoke good English and had "the most angelic smile", which could be prompted by a bar of chocolate from the surgeon's pocket.