Whilst in Havana for the Nuestra América international convoy, FRFI met with students from the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM). The following is an abridged version of our conversation with Ihab, a Palestinian student at ELAM who spoke to us about Cuban internationalism, healthcare under Cuban socialism, the devastating effects of the blockade and the relationship between the Cuban and Palestinian struggles.
I am a Palestinian student in Cuba. In 2019 I was given a scholarship to study medicine at ELAM, a project of Comandante Fidel Castro. The idea of this project is to bring students from all over the world, especially the most affected parts, train doctors from these countries, and send these doctors back to their countries or to the places where these doctors are needed. When I started there were about a thousand students from around 60 countries. I was interested in politics before, but a very important part of my political education was also on the island, understanding how international struggles all connect together. This led me to reaching the conclusion that all oppressed people have many things in common, and one enemy: imperialism.
The Cuban health system has been transformed from a weak system before the revolution to a very strong system, it’s a system that is not built for profit, but to save people. In the rest of the world, when a person gets sick, they don’t go directly to the hospital because they know it’s going to cost them a lot, in Cuba you can go to the hospital whenever you want, healthcare is totally free and you are not going to see any person who needs an operation staying at home or dying because they don’t have the money to pay. In Cuba patients will always find medical attention, receive treatment from the doctors who are always trying to give their best. Yet because of the blockade the country lacks medicines and resources. Personally, as a student in the health sector, it hurts us a lot when we see a patient where, yes, we could cure them, we could treat them, I can make the diagnosis of the disease they have, but I don’t have the medicine to give them to treat it. That is the most difficult point for all of us.
We are seeing the effects of the blockade every day. We are living in a situation where fuel cannot enter. All the hospitals in the world, not only those in Cuba, need energy to turn on the oxygen; to use the devices and equipment they have to do blood tests, to do all these things. When there is no oil, everything disappears. Right now, the hospital has to turn on its generators. However, I don’t know how long we can continue. The Cuban President has explained that we have gone three months without a single drop of oil entering the country. Other shortages are related to the equipment we need to make diagnoses, treat patients. There is a clause in the US laws of the blockade, that any product that has more than 10% US components cannot enter Cuba. And the one controlling all the production of this medical equipment is the United States, and almost always most of this equipment has more than 10% of its production from the US. When the most basic things are sometimes missing, the Cuban doctor always has to invent something.
Everyone has seen what the medical brigades do, there are the example of Cuban doctors around the world. What the United States is doing is clear, it does not want anyone to see that there is a country in Latin America, close to the US, which says no to US domination. If some ordinary person in Italy, in Britain, anywhere in the world, sees that Cuban doctors, those who do not have many things, with weak resources, go out and help the doctors of Italy, which is supposed to be a developed country with a strong health system, they are going to stand with Cuba and that is what the United States does not want. In addition, these medical brigades bring income for Cuba. For example, one of the contracts that Cuba had with Venezuela was oil for doctors and teachers, this is what the United States wants to destroy.
The Palestinian struggle and the Cuban struggle are united. It is the same struggle of all the oppressed people in the world. There are many similar things between Palestine and Cuba. They are two peoples who have suffered a lot. It is the same power that is blockading Cuba as that which finances the killing of Palestinians. The policy of the United States against Cuba is to take everything away from them, to suffocate the Cuban people so that they change their model. But in Palestine they do not want to squeeze the Palestinians too much because in the end, when you squeeze a people too much they will explode. This threatens Israel. Rather they want the Palestinian people to leave their land, to migrate to another place. It does not matter if they are dead, or if they migrate. The most important thing is for them to be cleared from Palestine. But we Cubans and Palestinians are going to resist until the last moment. We will not stop resisting because there is no other way. Always throughout history against all occupations there has been resistance. We are no different. We are just like the Vietnamese. We are just like the Chinese when they resisted the Japanese in the Second World War. We are just like the Soviets.
After the Cuban Revolution, the Cuban flag became a symbol of solidarity and anti-imperialist struggle. Solidarity became a part of Cuban culture. Cuba helps not only Palestine, but many, many, many countries in the world. Despite all the tragedies we are living through in Palestine, we also stand in solidarity with the Cuban people, because we know that any victory, however small it may be, is a victory for all peoples, not just for the Palestinians, not just for the Cubans, but for all of us.
Many people in the world owe a debt to Cuba, and I see no better time than this to repay that debt to Cuba. The Nuestra America flotilla and convoy is part of this, showing Cuba and the rest of the world knows that Cuba is not alone and that all of us, united, can win change. This is crucial because right now we are living in a world controlled by a system that is collapsing, we are seeing this clearly, in all the unjustified wars in Ukraine, in Iran, in Palestine. In the genocides they are committing in Sudan, in Congo and many more. It is very important to provide an image of a victory, even a small one, so that the whole world can see that we, the people, can indeed achieve something.
Long live Cuba! Long live Palestine!
