US doctor's 20 family members killed in war on Gaza

A Detroit-area doctor says he has lost 20 relatives to the violence in Gaza.

“It's been a hell of a month. It's a nightmare that does not want to end,” Dr. Emad Shehada (uh-MAHD’ shuh-HAH’-duh) said during an interview with WXYZ-TV.

Shehada is a pulmonologist with a practice in Rochester Hills, Michigan.

His parents were forced to move from the Palestinian territories in the late 1960s due to an armed conflict at the time. Shehada was born in Kuwait and moved around until settling down in Syria. He moved to the United States in the early 2000s to continue his medical education at Wayne State University in Detroit.

Shehada says he’s heartbroken that he wasn't able to save the lives of his family members caught up in the Israel-Hamas war.

“It's been horrible. The toughest time is at home when you get back from work,” he said. “During the work, I try to keep myself busy as much as possible, so I don't think about things.”

While his parents and sister now live in the U.S., his younger sister remains in Gaza.

Through his sister and other family and friends, he has learned that 20 of his relatives have died in bombings and airstrikes since Hamas' unprecedented Oct. 7 surprise attack on Israel.

Israel's response has brought unseen levels of death and destruction to Gaza.

“When you hear about these conflicts, your heart is broken for all those people that they die. But when it hits somebody that you know, it’s a total different thing,” Shehada said.

More than 11,000 Palestinians, two-thirds of them women and minors, have been killed since the war began, according to the Health Ministry in Gaza, which does not differentiate between civilian and militant deaths. About 2,700 people have been reported missing.

More than 1,200 people in Israel died, most of them in the Hamas attack, and about 240 hostages were taken from Israel into Gaza by Palestinian militants.

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