Gazan woman from viral video receives prosthetic leg in Colorado

Ahed Beseso arrived at Denver International Airport with her sister Friday night. This was the easiest part of her journey from Gaza.

That journey began in December after the 18-year-old Palestinian’s leg was mangled by an Israeli bomb and then amputated using dish soap and scissors. But without anesthesia. 

Beseso was at her home getting ready for lunch with her family when an Israeli bomb hit their building. A wall fell on her legs. Her family rushed to dig her out of the rubble.

“As they were moving things and bringing her down, they noticed that her leg was literally in shards. Just pieces of string and stuff,” Beseso said in Arabic through an interpreter.

Her uncle, who’s a surgeon, cleared the table of food, grabbed a pair of scissors, chlorine and dish soap and amputated her leg. The whole procedure was captured on cell phone video.

“With no anesthesia or antiseptics,” Beseso said.

They lived approximately a mile from Al-Shifa Hospital but because of the war raging outside their damaged home, Ahed had to spend days in her home under the care of her uncle, who had no medical supplies.

“She was coming in and out of waking,” Beseso said.

She says every time he had to change her homemade bandages made of clothing it was excruciating pain. Meanwhile, tanks surrounded her home.

“She would plead with her uncle, like, ‘if they were to come in, please leave,’” Beseso’s interpreter said.

Her uncle promised he would stay if the Israeli Defense Forces came in, but they never did. Eventually, she made it to Al-Shifa but conditions there weren’t much better.

“Because there was no food and water, her nutrition and all of that was really weakening,” Beseso’s interpreter said.

She applied for a visa to leave Gaza and says she was denied several times because of South Africa’s International Criminal Court case against Israel.

“Israel thought that if Ahed were to go out and they were to understand her story of what happened to her, that she would be testifying against Israel,” Beseso’s interpreter conveyed.

Eventually, she got a visa, but it took 18 trips to the border and more violence before she got out. She says the IDF fired at her sanctioned Red Cross van and randomly searched it.

“During several trips where she would try to go there, they would go in and as she was in the car with the Red Crescent drivers, they actually killed the driver,” Beseso’s interpreter said.

Once out of Gaza, the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund flew Beseso to the U.S. for medical treatment.

That’s when she got connected with Colorado surgeon Dr. Omar Mubarak. He evaluated her injuries from cell phone photos and hooked her up with a state-of-the-art prosthetic, which she picked up Saturday after a quick breakfast. Mubarak says he had to do something.

“My heart’s broken and I’m so happy we’ve got this limb and I hope this helps to improve her life,” said Mubarak. “I hope that we can help many other children in the future.”

With a new prosthesis, Beseso took her first steps in nearly six months in Colorado; something she never thought she would be able to do when she was suffering in Gaza.

Her journey started in Gaza but brought her here to Colorado, thanks to Mubarak.

Beseso considers herself lucky, despite her loss: “What happened to me is minuscule (compared) to what’s happening to others and all the other Palestinian children and the families that are in Gaza.”