Malnutrition, not leukemia: Italian doctors dismiss Israel’s claim over Palestinian woman’s death
Italian doctors have questioned the Israeli regime’s claim that a Palestinian woman died of leukemia, pointing instead to severe malnutrition after she arrived from Gaza too weak to survive.
The 20-year-old Palestinian Marah Abu Zuhri was evacuated from Gaza on a humanitarian flight organized by the Italian government but died in Pisa less than 24 hours after arriving at Santa Chiara Hospital.
Israeli authorities claimed Marah died from severe leukemia. They rejected suggestions that malnutrition contributed to her death.
Italian doctors, however, disputed the leukemia diagnosis, with La Nazione daily reporting that tests revealed no signs of the disease.
Professor Sara Galimberti, director of Hematology at Santa Chiara, said Marah arrived extremely weak and bedridden for a long period.
“We started therapy for leukemia that night,” Galimberti said. “When test results arrived, we stopped treatment because leukemia was not confirmed,” she noted.
Doctors provided high-calorie nutrition and transfusions, but Marah went into acute respiratory failure and suffered cardiac arrest.
In accordance with the family's religious beliefs, no autopsy was conducted. The hospital maintained that this decision did not alter the established medical findings. Marah's body remains under the care of the Legal Medicine department, where officials may still order a forensic autopsy if deemed necessary.
Meanwhile, Italian medical experts emphasized that prolonged malnutrition was almost certainly a critical factor in her deterioration and death.
Hunger-related deaths in Gaza continue to soar amid the Israeli-induced famine. The regime has sealed all border crossings, blocking the entry of all aid and worsening the already dire humanitarian conditions in Gaza since March 2, when it violated its ceasefire agreement with Hamas.
Gaza’s Health Ministry has reported that 263 people, including 112 children, have died from hunger-related causes in the besieged territory. Meanwhile, the director of al-Shifa Medical Complex warned that 55,000 pregnant women are currently suffering from malnutrition.
Rights groups and health organizations have long documented Israel’s targeting of Gaza’s medical infrastructure through repeated airstrikes, blockades on medical supplies, and restrictions on patients seeking treatment abroad.
Without urgent action, health officials warn Gaza’s hospitals will collapse entirely, leaving millions of civilians without lifesaving care.
Israel’s genocidal war, which began in October 2023, has so far killed over 62,004 Palestinians, mostly women and children.
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