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25 years later: we still care about innocent Palestinians

Cropped image of Debbie Goldberg, Executive Director of Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation, stands as medical supplies are unloaded from plane behind her at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-024]

By Armin Weinberg, PhD, Guest Contributor

I’ve had the pleasure of working with the staff at the McGovern Historical Center for several years. The opportunity to place articles, notes, correspondence, photos, equipment, and books related to the academic and research initiatives that my colleagues and I at Baylor College of Medicine conducted is truly an honor. My wife, of course, appreciates getting it all out of our condo!

When I started contributing the material, I was unsure of its real usefulness or value. Over time I am pleased to say this question has been answered. It has served as a means of introducing young students and scholars to the topic of radiation effects and events through not only my papers1 but those of many others via their contributed collections as well. Indeed, we have also been able to create a significant, and growing, set of audio/video interviews of individuals from the US and abroad that shine a light on the human side of our work and collaboration. This has been done primarily through our affiliation with Rice University and its Medical Humanities Program/Institute and will grow with the new digital resource Dialogues Across Health, Science, Humanities and Archives (DAHSHA).

However, today I want to share what I believe is an important bit of history that is captured at the archive through an interview with a former Executive Director of the Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation (THMRF). As this is posted, it will be 124 days into the Israel/Hamas war. So you might wonder what does a collection about Radiation Effects and Events have to do with this? Nothing. Yet, it does.

THMRF began as an effort to establish funding and research collaborations between physicians/scientists in the Texas Medical Center and at the Hadassah Medical Organization in Israel. The first area the Director General of Hadassah asked us to help with was the large number of immigrants to Israel from the former Soviet Union complaining and concerned about their exposure to the fallout from the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant disaster. What we quickly learned was that we actually also had immigrants with these concerns here in the United States of America including many here in Houston.

As we were pursuing research projects, exchanges and dialogues, our Israeli colleagues asked us for help on a matter unrelated to radiation. They were concerned about their Palestinian patients, who with the implementation of the Oslo Accord agreement (PLO control and administration) of the West Bank and Gaza, would likely no longer have ready access to many needed medical supplies and drugs (that they had had via Hadassah Hospitals.)

At the same time, my colleagues at Hadassah became aware of my work in Kazakhstan. There our American International Healthcare Alliance (AIHA) partnership, assisted by the US Department of State and USAID, was able to deliver plane-loads of excess Defense Department military medical equipment and supplies, as well as pharmaceutical donations from other organizations like AmeriCares. These resources helped Kazakhstan overcome a 50-year history of being at the center of the USSR nuclear testing program. Could we do the same for the people in Gaza? Why not?

I of course asked our young energetic Executive Director of THMRF, Debbie Zarkowsky Goldberg, to engage. Her recollection is captured through a rich interview that now resides in the archive (McGovern Historical Center). It recalls a little-known effort that reveals how Israelis and Americans (Jew and non-Jew) came together to help provide resources for the Palestinian people in Gaza. It was our Israeli colleagues who helped identify–with their now former Hadassah colleagues– the needed resources that AmeriCares could provide. According to Goldberg:

I reached out to our staff contact at AmeriCares who thought it was a great idea. My contact at the State Department could not commit to providing the plane but connected me to those with whom they had contracted for other airlifts. The idea was brought back to the board of THMRF, who agreed assuming we could also get the Arab and Palestinian medical community to participate.

And so we did indeed manage to charter an airplane, fill it with supplies, and distribute them to the Palestinian Authority on February 9, 1999.

It was our hope that this initiative would not only do good, but also get some much-needed positive news coverage showing that collaboration and caring was making a difference. Unfortunately, we got very little coverage as King Hussein of Jordan died the day before the plane arrived. The media paid little attention to our efforts thus an opportunity was lost, but this important bit of TMC history is captured at the archives. There were many lessons learned and a bit of humor that are recalled in Debbie’s interview.

Fast forward to today as yet again, we worry about innocent Palestinians much like we did 25 years ago. As innocent lives are being lost, hostages remain captive, and demonstrations, violence and rhetoric further the hate, we’re left wondering what anyone can do. What can we do? What can I do?

I can share the history that showed we cared, wanted to enhance the opportunity for peace. We need to do so again today. Perhaps remembering and building upon this history will help us find another opportunity to show we care.

The archive having this brief interview allows me now to highlight the humanity seen then, and which I believe remains today.

I write to illustrate that although the events of today are separated by 25 years, at our core, we are all human and we all should care–and we do.


Armin Weinberg is a Clinical Professor at Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Weinberg spearheaded international partnerships in the Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Israel on the health effects of radiation. He is currently an Adjunct Professor at Rice University where he mentors students in the medical humanities program helping build the archives related to his work in both radiation effects and events as well as cancer health disparities. Dr. Weinberg is a member of the Archives Advisory Committee for the McGovern Historical Center.

To explore the materials related to this post, visit Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records on the McGovern Historical Center’s collection site.


Images from the collection

Delegation watches as the cargo plane with medical supplies arrives at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-012]
Delegation watches as the cargo plane with medical supplies arrives at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-012]

Cargo plane carrying medical supplies arrives at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. It was the only cargo plane to ever land at the airport, which operated 1998-2000. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-016]
Cargo plane carrying medical supplies arrives at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. It was the only cargo plane to ever land at the airport, which operated 1998-2000. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-016]

Medical supplies begin to be unloaded from plane at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. The plane is a cargo variant of the Douglas DC-8, manufactured between 1965-1972. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-018]
Medical supplies begin to be unloaded from plane at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. The plane is a cargo variant of the Douglas DC-8, manufactured between 1965-1972. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-018]

Medical supplies are unloaded from the cargo plane at at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-020]
Medical supplies are unloaded from the cargo plane at at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-020]

Debbie Goldberg, Executive Director of Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation, talks to media at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-023]
Debbie Goldberg, Executive Director of Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation, talks to media at Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-023]

Debbie Goldberg, Executive Director of Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation, with others in the Israeli and Palestinian delegation during the press conference inside Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-029]
Debbie Goldberg, Executive Director of Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation, with others in the Israeli and Palestinian delegation during the press conference inside Yasser Arafat International Airport in Gaza on February 9, 1999. [IC 105 Texas Hadassah Medical Research Foundation records, McGovern Historical Center, TMC Library, IC105-029]