The limited reopening of the Rafah crossing has been met not with relief, but with urgent pleas from Gaza’s medical community, who say tens of thousands of patients remain trapped without access to life-saving treatment. Movement through the crossing has resumed in both directions, yet only in tightly controlled numbers and under restrictive procedures that fail to match the scale of medical need created by a genocidal war that has devastated the Strip’s health system.

Hospitals across Gaza are operating in a state of near paralysis. Doctors report that surgical wards lack staff, medicines and even basic equipment, leaving thousands of wounded people without operations they urgently require. Chronic patients, including those with cancer, kidney failure and blood disorders, are also facing life-threatening interruptions to treatment. Medical officials warn that any evacuation system that allows only a fraction of patients to leave effectively condemns the rest, as care inside Gaza has been reduced to emergency improvisation rather than proper medicine.

The destruction of health infrastructure has compounded the crisis. Most hospitals are either completely out of service or functioning far below medical standards due to power cuts, fuel shortages and damaged facilities. Surgeons describe working with worn-out tools, performing operations manually and rationing care in ways that would be unthinkable under normal conditions. With tens of thousands awaiting second or corrective surgeries, delays are measured not in inconvenience, but in lives lost.

Despite the symbolic reopening of Rafah, doctors stress that the crossing is not operating as a genuine humanitarian corridor. Current arrangements do not guarantee safe, sustained access for patients, while thousands of approved medical referrals remain stuck awaiting permission to travel. Health professionals are calling for immediate international action to establish unrestricted medical pathways, warning that without mass evacuation, the health catastrophe created by the genocidal war will only deepen.