Violence mounts against Iraqi doctors as COVID-19 cases spike

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Relatives of a patient, who died from COVID-19, beat up Tarik Sheibani, 47, an Iraqi doctor and director of Al-Amal Hospital, in this still image taken from CCTV footage obtained by Reuters, in Najaf, Iraq August 27, 2020. (Reuters)
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Updated 23 September 2020
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Violence mounts against Iraqi doctors as COVID-19 cases spike

  • “All the doctors are scared,” said Sheibani, speaking at his home in Kufa a few weeks after the Aug. 28 attack
  • More than 8,000 people have died, a number that some doctors fear will rise sharply

NAJAF: Iraqi doctor Tariq Al-Sheibani remembers little else beyond cowering on the ground as a dozen relatives of a patient, who had just died of COVID-19, beat him unconscious.
About two hours later the 47-year-old director of Al-Amal Hospital in the southern city of Najaf woke up in a different clinic with bruises all over his body.
“All the doctors are scared,” said Sheibani, speaking at his home in Kufa a few weeks after the Aug. 28 attack. “Every time a patient dies, we all hold our breath.”
He is one of many doctors struggling to do their job as COVID-19 cases rise sharply in Iraq.
They are working within a health service that has been left to decay through years of civil conflict and underfunding, and now face the added threat of physical attack by grieving and desperate families.
Reuters spoke to seven doctors, including the head of Iraq’s Medical Association, who described a growing pattern of assaults on medical staff. Dozens have taken place since the COVID-19 pandemic began.
Meanwhile, the United Nations has warned that the pandemic could spiral out of control in Iraq.




Tarik Sheibani, 47, an Iraqi doctor and director of Al-Amal Hospital, wears a protective suit at a hospital where he treats coronavirus disease patients, in Najaf, Iraq September 13, 2020. (Reuters)


Authorities have lifted many lockdown measures, allowing restaurants and places of worship to reopen, but they have shut borders to pilgrims ahead of a large Shiite Muslim pilgrimage that normally draws millions to the south of the country.
Iraq has recorded several thousand new coronavirus infections every day, and the total now exceeds 300,000.
More than 8,000 people have died, a number that some doctors fear will rise sharply, putting frontline health care workers under huge pressure and in some cases in physical danger.
The health ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the COVID situation in Iraq and medics’ complaints about the threat of violence.
Sheibani, whose beating went viral when CCTV footage circulated online, said the family of the deceased patient blamed his staff for the death. He said he did not know how the video reached the public domain.
The patient had arrived at hospital in critical condition.
“I hate myself and I hate the day I became a doctor in Iraq,” Sheibani told Reuters. “They brought the patient in his final stages and he died, and they want the health system to bear the responsibility.”
Enforcing health safety guidelines within the hospital is not always easy, especially when tensions between families of sick patients and hospital staff are running high.
During a recent visit to Sheibani’s hospital, which is a coronavirus isolation center, Reuters reporters saw relatives of COVID-19 patients coming in and out of the ward without wearing full protective gear as they are supposed to.
Some were only wearing surgical face masks.
Iraq is fighting the pandemic with a depleted force of doctors and nurses.
In 2018, it had just 2.1 nurses and midwives per thousand people, compared with Jordan’s 3.2 and Lebanon’s 3.7, according to official estimates. It had 0.83 doctors per thousand people, while neighboring Jordan, for example, had 2.3.
There are also significant shortages of drugs, oxygen, and vital medical equipment, the result of years of underspending.
Many young doctors say they are overworked, putting in 12-16 hour shifts every day meaning they are more likely to make mistakes in prescriptions and treatment. Some take kickbacks for handing over certain drugs, physicians told Reuters.
The Health Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Government vows action
Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi has condemned the attacks against medical staff and promised to hold perpetrators to account.
The attacks have increased in recent months, said Medical Association president Abdul Ameer Hussein. He said his association could not keep track of all of them, but they include verbal and physical abuse and even stabbings.
Sheibani filed a complaint with police, but he said he had received threats from the people who beat him up to drop the case.




Tarik Sheibani, 47, an Iraqi doctor and director of Al-Amal Hospital, wears a protective suit as he walks at a quarantine ward at Al-Amal Hospital in Najaf, Iraq September 13, 2020. (Reuters)


“They might attack me or my family,” Sheibani said, adding that he no longer left his house alone.
Doctors say the government has not taken tough enough action to protect them from violence, which they have faced for years even before the pandemic.
The health ministry said in a statement on Saturday that it would assign its legal division to file lawsuits against those who attacked health workers, as well as those medics who fell short in treating patients.
According to the Medical Association, at least 320 doctors have been killed since 2003, when US-led forces toppled President Saddam Hussein, ushering in years of sectarian violence and extremist insurgencies.
Thousands more have been kidnapped or threatened.
Doctors and human rights activists say the state is so weak that it cannot bring doctor’s assailants to justice, especially if they come from a powerful tribe or belong to a militia.
“The government can’t protect doctors from tribes. Doctors end up dropping the cases because they receive threats,” said Hussein, adding that he often asks tribal leaders to mediate when a doctor is being threatened.
Doctors have gone on strike and protested in recent months over what they say is government inaction over the attacks.
Abbas Alaulddin, 27, a doctor in Baghdad who was assaulted last week by the family of a patient who died of COVID-19, said he was considering seeking asylum.
“The situation here is unbearable.”


Israel is trying to destabilize Lebanon and Syria, Arab League chief laments

Updated 05 April 2025
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Israel is trying to destabilize Lebanon and Syria, Arab League chief laments

  • Israel’s resumption of targeted assassinations in Lebanon is an unacceptable and condemnable breach of the ceasefire agreement it signed with Lebanon late last year, Aboul Gheit said in a statement

CAIRO: Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit on Saturday accused Israel of trying to destabilize Syria and Lebanon through irresponsible military provocations, in “flagrant disregard for international legal norms.”

In a statement, Aboul Gheit lamented that global inaction has further emboldened the Zionist state.

“(T)he wars waged by Israel on the occupied Palestinian territories, Lebanon, and Syria have entered a new phase of complete recklessness, deliberately violating signed agreements, invading countries, and killing more civilians,” said the statement carried by the Saudi Press Agency.

He said Israel’s resumption of targeted assassinations in Lebanon is an unacceptable and condemnable breach of the ceasefire agreement it signed with Lebanon late last year. 

Aboul Gheit suggested that Israel’s actions were driven by narrow domestic agendas at the expense of civilian lives and regional peace.

“It seems that the Israeli war machine does not want to stop as long as the occupation leaders insist on facing their internal crises by exporting them abroad, and this situation has become clear to everyone,” he said.

As per the Gaza Ministry of Health’s count last week, more than 50,000 people have been killed and over 113,200 wounded in Israeli attacks on Palestinian territories in retaliation against the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas surprise attack on southern Israel.

In Lebanon, war monitors have said at least 3,961 people were killed and at least 16,520, wounded in Israel’s war with the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement from October 8, 2023, to November 26, 2024.

Syria’s new government accused Israel on April 3 of mounting a deadly destabilization campaign after a wave of strikes on military targets, including an airport, and a ground incursion killed 13 people, in the southern province of Daraa. 


Syrian government says studying Amnesty report on massacres

Updated 05 April 2025
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Syrian government says studying Amnesty report on massacres

Damascus: Syria’s government said late Friday it was “closely following” the findings of a new Amnesty International report urging an investigation into sectarian massacres last month.
Amnesty called on the Syrian government in a report on Thursday to ensure accountability for the massacres targeting the Alawite minority, saying they may constitute war crimes.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor has said security forces and allied groups killed more than 1,700 civilians, mostly Alawites, during the violence.
Interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa, whose Islamist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) led the offensive that toppled longtime ruler Bashar Assad in December, has vowed to prosecute those responsible.
In a statement on Friday, the government said it had been “following closely the Amnesty report” and its “preliminary findings.”
“It is up to the Independent National Commission for Investigation and Fact-Finding to evaluate them, in accordance with the mandate, independence, and broad powers granted to it by presidential decree,” it said.
The Syrian authorities have accused armed Assad supporters of sparking the violence by attacking the new security forces.
The government on Friday complained the report failed to note “the broader context of the events.”
It said the violence began with a “premeditated assault” by the “remnants of the previous regime, targeting army and internal security personnel.”
In the ensuing chaos, “acts of retaliation and serious violations occurred,” it said, vowing that these would be investigated and a report issued within a month.


Red Cross warns of continued threat of landmines in Iraq

Updated 05 April 2025
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Red Cross warns of continued threat of landmines in Iraq

  • Organization calls for greater effort to reduce contamination that spans 2,100 sq. km.
  • More than 80 casualties recorded since 2023

LONDON: The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Friday that landmines and explosive remnants of war continue to pose a severe threat in Iraq, contaminating an estimated 2,100 sq. km.

In a statement issued to coincide with the International Day for Mine Awareness, the organization said landmines from past conflicts, including the Iran-Iraq War and the 2014–17 battle against Daesh, remained a major hazard.

The contamination had resulted in civilian casualties, forced displacement, restricted farmland access and slowed reconstruction efforts, it said.

Between 2023 and 2024, the ICRC recorded 78 casualties from landmines and remnants of war in Iraq. Earlier this year, three students were killed in an explosion in Abu Al-Khasib, Basra.

The ICRC has appealed for greater efforts to reduce contamination and support mine-affected communities. Clearance operations continue in cooperation with national authorities and humanitarian partners.

The call for action comes at a time when several NATO member states, namely Poland, Finland and the Baltic states, have signaled their intention to withdraw from the Ottawa Convention, the international treaty banning antipersonnel landmines. They cited the growing military threat from Russia as the reason for reconsidering the ban.

Meanwhile, the US, previously the largest funder of global mine clearance efforts, has cut back support due to a foreign aid review under the Trump administration.

Washington had contributed over $300 million annually, covering 40 percent of total international mine action funding, according to the 2024 Landmine Monitor report, which led to major clearance efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Laos.

A State Department official said last month that the US had restarted some global humanitarian demining programs but provided no details.


Hamas says Israeli offensive in Gaza ‘highly dangerous’ for hostages

Updated 04 April 2025
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Hamas says Israeli offensive in Gaza ‘highly dangerous’ for hostages

  • “We have decided not to transfer these (hostages)... but (this situation) is highly dangerous to their lives,” said Abu Obeida

GAZA CITY: Hamas on Friday said Israel’s offensive in Gaza was creating a “highly dangerous” situation for the hostages held there, warning that half of the living captives were in areas where the army had ordered evacuations.
“Half of the living Israeli (hostages) are located in areas that the Israeli occupation army has requested to be evacuated in recent days,” Abu Obeida, spokesman for Hamas’s armed wing, said in a statement. “We have decided not to transfer these (hostages)... but (this situation) is highly dangerous to their lives.”


Kurdish fighters leave northern city in Syria as part of deal with central government

Updated 04 April 2025
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Kurdish fighters leave northern city in Syria as part of deal with central government

  • The fighters left the predominantly Kurdish northern neighborhoods of Sheikh Maksoud and Achrafieh
  • The deal is a boost to an agreement reached last month

ALEPPO, Syria: Scores of US-backed Kurdish fighters left two neighborhoods in the Syrian Arab Republic’s northern city of Aleppo Friday as part of a deal with the central government in Damascus, which is expanding its authority in the country.
The fighters left the predominantly Kurdish northern neighborhoods of Sheikh Maksoud and Achrafieh, which had been under the control of Kurdish fighters in Aleppo over the past decade.
The deal is a boost to an agreement reached last month between Syria’s interim government and the Kurdish-led authority that controls the country’s northeast. The deal could eventually lead to the merger of the main US-backed force in Syria into the Syrian army.
The withdrawal of fighters from the US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces came a day after dozens of prisoners from both sides were freed in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city.
Syria’s state news agency, SANA, reported that government forces were deployed along the road that SDF fighters will use to move between Aleppo and areas east of the Euphrates River, where the Kurdish-led force controls nearly a quarter of Syria.
Sheikh Maksoud and Achrafieh had been under SDF control since 2015 and remained so even when forces of ousted President Bashar Assad captured Aleppo in late 2016. The two neighborhoods remained under SDF control when forces loyal to current interim President Ahmad Al-Sharaa captured the city in November, and days later captured the capital, Damascus, removing Assad from power.
After being marginalized for decades under the rule of the Assad family rule, the deal signed last month promises Syria’s Kurds “constitutional rights,” including using and teaching their language, which were banned for decades.
Hundreds of thousands of Kurds, who were displaced during Syria’s nearly 14-year civil war, will return to their homes. Thousands of Kurds living in Syria who have been deprived of nationality for decades under Assad will be given the right of citizenship, according to the agreement.
Kurds made up 10 percent of the country’s prewar population of 23 million. Kurdish leaders say they don’t want full autonomy with their own government and parliament. They want decentralization and room to run their day-to day-affairs.