Dr. Faroze Sidhwa has been widely praised for his work as a surgeon in Gaza. Yet in a recent campus talk, he voiced assertions about Israel and Hamas that are contested, incomplete, or unsupported.

Connecticut College held the 17th session of its “Understanding Israel/Palestine” webinar series on April 29, marking the final installment for this academic year. The featured speaker was Sidhwa.

Sidhwa deserves admiration for what he has done in Gaza. He has worked as a surgeon in a hospital in the center of a dangerous war zone and healed Gaza’s citizens, including many innocent children.

But Sidhwa has chosen to denigrate Israel, while nearly absolving Hamas of any responsibility for the events on or after October 7, 2023. His remarks included claims that are disputed or unverified, along with rhetoric that critics would regard as crossing into antisemitic framing.

As has been the norm in prior webinars in this series, the faculty moderator did not ask any questions that challenged the accuracy of Sidhwa’s claims. Indeed, she amplified many of his falsehoods and interjected more of her own.

Consider several of his claims.

Sidhwa rose to prominence when an article he wrote was published by the New York Times. He compiled reports from 65 doctors, nurses and paramedics about the conditions and injuries treated in Gaza’s hospitals. In the article and in his talk, he accused the Israeli army of intentionally shooting children in the head. But this accusation has been discredited, and Hamas itself has an established record of targeting and shooting children.

Sidhwa repeated the accusation of genocide regarding Israel’s actions in Gaza. As I have written, the legal definition of genocide requires the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a people. While the loss of civilian life is tragic, there is no evidence of attacks by Israel that intentionally targeted civilians. There is much counterevidence to the charge, including, as Sidhwa himself mentioned, Israel providing evacuation notices to civilians so that they can depart from targeted areas.

Sidhwa went further and claimed that Israel has intentionally targeted the top doctors at hospitals, and that........

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