Medical Mission to Gaza: Indonesia's Clever Strategy to Avoid Getting Entangled in Conflicts

Amid the intensifying currents of global geopolitics, often driven solely by calculations of interest, I am increasingly convinced that the Palestinian issue remains one of the clearest tests of the world’s humanitarian conscience. Palestine is not merely a conflict over territory. It is a mirror reflecting how far modern humanity is still willing to stand on the principles of justice. That is why, when I accompanied the Palestinian delegation led by Dr. Taysir Hamdan Sulaiman in a meeting with the Indonesian Minister of Culture Fadli Zon on 5 May 2026, I viewed that encounter not as an ordinary institutional agenda. I saw it as part of Indonesia’s historical responsibility towards the struggle for Palestinian independence. Dr. Taysir Sulaiman’s visit to Indonesia, directly welcomed by Minister Fadli Zon, was a joyful moment for me amid unpleasant rumours regarding the rejection of an entry visa for the Palestinian delegation led by Dr. Bassim Naim, the former Palestinian Health Minister who facilitated the establishment of the Indonesian Hospital in Gaza in 2011. Dr. Taysir is no ordinary figure. He is a comrade to many Hamas leaders who have languished in Zionist Israeli prisons for 19 years. He once shared a cell with the late Yahya Sinwar and other struggle figures, and was released from detention as part of the exchange package of 1,047 Palestinian prisoners for the phenomenal Zionist corporal Gilad Shalit during the period of October and December 2011. Since the beginning of independence, Indonesia has placed Palestine in a very special position in our foreign policy. Support for Palestine is not merely a diplomatic stance, but part of the nation’s moral identity embedded in the constitution and alive in the collective consciousness of the Indonesian people. In that meeting, I conveyed that support for Palestine must not stop at slogans of solidarity or symbolic political statements. That support must be translated into sustainable strategic steps, both through humanitarian channels, education, cultural diplomacy, and strengthening public awareness. I believe that the Palestinian struggle today is not only taking place on the battlefield, but also in the arena of narrative and historical memory. For that reason, I proposed to the Minister of Culture the idea of building a Museum of the Palestinian Genocide in Indonesia. For me, that museum is not merely a physical building or an ordinary cultural project. It is an effort to nurture the collective memory of humanity so that the humanitarian tragedy in Palestine is not allowed to sink into the noise of global geopolitics. History shows that when tragedies are forgotten, the path for the repetition of injustice will open again.