If the world were honest with itself, it would admit that some crimes no longer bother to hide. They are committed openly, in full view of cameras, satellites, and international institutions that claim to be watching, documenting, and safeguarding human rights.

In 2025, if there were a grim global title that captured this reality, Dr Hussam Abu Safiya would be its most visible recipient. Not because he sought attention, but because his abduction was designed to be seen.

Dr Abu Safiya, a senior Palestinian physician and hospital director in Gaza, was taken directly from his workplace. He was wearing his medical gown. A tank stood where an ambulance should have been. Soldiers replaced patients. The scene was not chaotic; it was deliberate. This was not an arrest carried out quietly under legal pretence. It was a detention operation conducted openly, confidently, and without fear of consequence.

His crime was not violence. It was speech. Calm, professional, documented speech about the siege of hospitals, the bombing of medical facilities, the blocking of humanitarian aid, and the systematic dismantling of Gaza’s health system. He spoke as a doctor, not as a politician. That, it seems, was intolerable.

READ: Palestinian Forum in Britain launches campaign to secure the release of Dr Hossam Abu Safiya

From Gaza hospital........

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