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UAE announces SpaceX's Starlink to be available at field hospital in Gaza Strip

Connection will enable potentially life-saving medical consultations via real-time video calling

Published: Wed 14 Feb 2024, 10:11 PM

Updated: Thu 15 Feb 2024, 10:06 AM

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  • WAM

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Photo: Wam file

Photo: Wam file

The UAE has announced that it is working in partnership with various international and regional organisations and hospitals to introduce SpaceX's Starlink satellite broadband at its field hospital in the Gaza Strip.

In a statement, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs affirmed that this step further underscores the UAE's unwavering efforts to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people during the ongoing war. The Starlink internet service will be made available in the field hospital in the Strip, in order to enable potentially life-saving medical consultations via real-time video calling.

The Ministry highlighted the importance of reliable high-speed internet in ensuring quality medical care by hospitals serving Palestinians within the Gaza Strip.

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In this regard, the UAE reaffirmed the importance of the immediate, safe, sustainable and unhindered delivery of relief and humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.

The international organisations and hospitals working in partnership with the UAE include Great Ormond Street Hospital in London, University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Trust, the Children's National Medical Center in Washington DC, Boston Children's Hospital, the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Cleveland Clinic Foundation in the USA, the Bambino Gesù Children's Hospital in Rome, the Giannina Gaslini Institute in Genoa, Italy and the Hospital Sant Joan de Déu in Barcelona, Spain.

Starlink in Gaza

Billionaire Elon Musk on Saturday said that his Starlink satellite service would support internet access for "internationally recognised aid organisations in Gaza," which have faced a telecommunications blackout since Friday.

Starlink is a network of satellites in low Earth orbit that can provide internet to remote locations, or areas that have had normal communications infrastructure disabled.

Musk, who owns Starlink operator SpaceX, was responding to a post by US Democrat congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in which she called the communications blackout in Gaza "unacceptable".

"Starlink will support connectivity to internationally recognised aid organisations in Gaza," Musk wrote on X, formerly Twitter, which he also owns.

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