Mads Fredrik Gilbert (born June 2, 1947, Porsgrunn) is a Norwegian doctor, solidarity worker and a member of the socialist party Red.[1] He received his PhD at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa.[2] He is a specialist in anesthesiology and a leader of the emergency medicine department of University Hospital of North Norway, and has been a professor of emergency medicine at the University of Tromsø since 1995.
Gilbert has broad range international experiences, in particular from locations that merge medical and political issues. He has done volunteer work at a kibbutz.[3] Later he became actively involved with solidarity work concerning Palestinians since the 1970s, he has served as a doctor during numerous periods in the Palestinian territories and Lebanon. His efforts have been central to the efforts that have led the city of Tromsø, since 2001 a twin town of Gaza, to claim to be the city that has sent more health workers to the Palestinian territories than any other in the world.[4]
Contents |
Following a skiing accident in January 2000 Anna Bågenholm was trapped for more than an hour in icy waters, head under water, and was pronounced clinically dead, but survived after the efforts of Gilbert and his team.[5] This represented the lowest survived body temperature recorded.[6] Gilbert was awarded Årets nordlending 2000 ("Northern Norwegian of the year, 2000", by the readership of the Tromsø newspaper Nordlys.[7][8][9] Gilbert's breakthrough in treating extreme hypothermia has been chronicled in Cheating death : the doctors and medical miracles that are saving lives against all odds by Sanjay Gupta, as well as being featured in CNN's television program Another Day: Cheating Death.
Often portrayed by Norwegian media with controversial statements, Gilbert is on record criticizing Médecins Sans Frontières for its failure to take positions in conflicts.[10] A statement made to Dagbladet in the wake of the September 11 attacks was met with strong reactions.[1] His statement to Dagbladet was: "The attack on New York did not come as a surprise with the politics the West has followed the last decades. I am upset by the terrorist attack, but I am at least as upset over the suffering that the US has caused. It is in this context that 5000 dead has to be seen. If the U.S. government has a legitimate right to bomb and kill civilians in Iraq, the oppressed has a moral right to attack the U.S. with the weapons they may create as well. Dead civilians are the same whether they are Americans, Palestinians or Iraqis." When asked if he supported a terrorist attack against the US he answered: "Terror is a poor weapon, but my answer is yes, within the context I have mentioned." [11]
The incident was described by Nordlys editor Hans Kristian Amundsen as "probably the stupidest thing he's ever done", citing it as proof that Gilbert is a "hopeless politician".[1] In an interview with the Norwegian news agency NTB in 2009, Gilbert described his own statements in the aftermath of 9/11 as "unwise and ill-considered", stressing that he is completely against terror against civilians.[12]
On being a doctor as well as a politician, Gilbert has said the two roles are indistinguishable, and that "there is little in medicine that isn't politics".[13]
Gilbert arrived on emergency assignment for the Norwegian Aid Committee (NORWAC) with the surgeon Erik Fosse to support the humanitarian effort at al-Shifa Hospital during the 2008–2009 Israel–Gaza conflict,[14][15][16] a period when foreign journalists were barred from entering the Gaza Strip.[17] As international media reported from outside the conflict zone, Gilbert maintained frequent contact with Norwegian media,[18][19] as well as segments of the world press, including CNN, BBC, ABC and Al Jazeera.[14]
Following a grenade strike to a Gaza City vegetable market on January 3, Gilbert sent an SMS text to his Norwegian and international contacts, with an appeal for all who read it to pass it on.[20][21][22]
| “ | From doctor Mads Gilbert in Gaza: Thanks for your support. They bombed the central vegetable market in Gaza city two hours ago. 80 injured, 20 killed. All came here to Shifa. Hades! We wade in death, blood and amputees. Many children. Pregnant woman. I have never experienced anything this horrible. Now we hear tanks. Tell it, pass it on, shout it. Anything. DO SOMETHING! DO MORE! We're living in the history books now, all of us! | ” |
The ensuing response sparked reports of Gilbert's message on a global scale,[24] and scores of declarations of support to the Norwegian Palestine Committee.[25]
Asked about this incident in an interview with Al Jazeera, Gilbert answered: "...people in Gaza must know that they are not on their own, many people are with them, although we are not there but we are with them and they must not give up, for the people of the free world ponder on your patience and inspire from your strenghth. If you give up then the people behind you will give up..." [26]
The doctors were "received as heroes" by the Norwegian public,[27] and received praise from several commentators. Among critics were right-wing Norwegian FrP party leader Siv Jensen who described Gilbert as a "local politician from Rødt", criticizing that he has been permitted without censorship to act as a voice of anti-Israel propaganda.[8][28] Melanie Phillips, a columnist for The Spectator and Jennifer Lawinski for Fox News, voiced criticism similar to Siv Jensen's.[29][30]
Jensen's statements have in turn been strongly criticized by Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs Jonas Gahr Støre, who called her statements "confused" and said that "It is outrageous that she puts into question the integrity of practitioners, who I am sure treat the wounded and injured as they need it. Gilbert and I could completely disagree on political matters, but not on the matters at hand [treatment of civilian casualties].[31][32]
On January 5, after 10 days of the Israeli heavy air bombardment on Gaza strip, BBC news reporter Rushdi Abu Alouf in Gaza interviewed Dr. Mads Gilbert on the status inside Gaza's AL-Shifa Hospital. In the interview Dr. Gilbert stated that an overwhelming majority of the casualties he had treated were civilians, and women and children alone made up 25% of the death toll, and 45% of the wounded.[33][34]
On January 8, 2009, while in Gaza, Mads Gilbert was in a video which appeared on CNN which showed the brother of a Palestinian TV producer dying while Gilbert and another doctor worked to save him. This video became subject to controversy as several pro-Israel bloggers made accusations that the scene was staged.[35] World News and Features, the camera crew's employer, and the producer himself denounced the allegations. CNN also stated on their web site that they stand by the video.[36][37] Two weeks later, the CNN published a video report on their website refuting the bloggers' allegations point by point. Two independent doctors who were showed the video said that they had no doubt that the hospital scene and Gilbert's work was genuine.[35]
In the period that followed Gilbert and Fosse's extraction from Gaza, they continued to be covered in Norwegian and international media. In a special report to the medical journal The Lancet, Gilbert and Fosse described the Gaza situation as a "nightmarish havoc", stating that they had "witnessed the most horrific war injuries in men, women and children of all ages in numbers almost too large to comprehend".[38]
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor responded to the Lancet report by criticizing Gilbert for "spreading vicious lies".[38] In statements to Associated Press Palmor claimed, "Dr. Gilbert is notorious for his radical far left opinions and his systematic demonizaton of Israel. He has already accused Israel of almost every nightmarish crime in the book only to ignore the refutation of every one of his allegations", adding, "His stories are worthy of Dante's imagination but have been proved time and again to be far removed from reality. It is a pity that serious members of the medical profession should allow themselves to be dragged into an excessive of mad Mads".[38]
In a response to these statements Gilbert stated: "This is a part of the propaganda war. We are not surprised and take this very calmly. We tell the truth and do not need to lie. If Israel think we are lying, they can just open the borders and let the world's press into Gaza. Then one will soon find out who is lying." [39]
In 2009 he received the Fritt Ord Honorary Award together with Erik Fosse.[40]
Mads Gilbert and Erik Fosse have written a book called Eyes in Gaza, which is an account of their time in Gaza.[41]