Healthcare Workers for Palestine Twin Cities hosted a press conference outside the Minnesota State Capitol in St. Paul on Oct. 25 to discuss the censorship of health care workers expressing their thoughts about the war in Palestine.

Around 50 people attended the press conference, which lasted about two hours and advocated for health care workers’ ability to speak in support of Palestinians and Palestinian Americans.

The attending speakers came from Students for Justice in Palestine, American Muslims for Palestine, Families Against Military Madness, White Coats for Black Lives and Jewish Voice for Peace.

Some of the attendees, many of them wearing scrubs, donned masks with the words “censored” and “silenced” over their mouths.

Dr. Asfia Qaadir presented a live webinar on Zoom for PrairieCare in July about supporting patients from diverse backgrounds, including Palestinians. PrairieCare sent out an apology regarding the content of the Zoom and announced it would not be posted for viewing after the fact, Alycia Garubanda, a speech pathologist at Abbott Northwestern Hospital who attended Qaadir’s live webinar, said.

Many health care workers who supported Palestine felt they were unable to fully support their patients after PrairieCare’s reaction to the webinar, Garubanda said.

The rally consisted of speeches, chants and music. The speeches contained personal thoughts and experiences as well as the stories of Palestinian health care workers killed in the war.

Many of the speeches expressed concern regarding the censorship of health care workers when speaking about Palestine at work.

Qaadir, a child and adolescent psychiatrist at PrairieCare who presented a training webinar on supporting BIPOC and Palestinian patients, said censoring health care workers worried her, largely due to the implications it puts on caring for patients.

“Right now across the U.S., there is a widespread practice of banning Palestinian health education inside of hospitals, and people don’t realize that that’s happening,” Qaadir said. “That’s very problematic because it makes it impossible for us as health care workers to render trauma-informed care, to do best practices with all our patients.”

Garubanda said it is apparent to her the health care system does not want its providers to talk about Palestine. She said the health care system is hypocritical in how it prioritizes diversity, equity and inclusion.

“Every health care institution’s statements and values around DEI and racial equity are, frankly, garbage,” Garubanda said. “We can’t believe what you say because we see what you do. Your silencing us is directly harming our patients in this community.”

It is a disservice to the patients of providers to not educate them about these issues, Garubanda said.

“We cannot effectively treat any of our patients if we don’t understand the context that brings them to us,” Garubanda said. “And understanding historical, generational trauma and effects of all of this is vital for us to show up for our patients. If we pretend like our patients just arrive to us without any background before they arrive, we are not treating them effectively.”

Maryam Waz, a Palestinian-American nurse and University Medical School student who shortened her last name to protect her family still in Palestine, said ignoring the war goes against what it means to be a health care provider.

Waz said she was frustrated by her situation as a medical student.

“We have health care workers dying by the thousands, and my people dying, and I’m just supposed to go to class and pretend it’s okay and learn about these theories that they themselves don’t apply,” Waz said. “You learn about all these theories of socialist advocacy, yet there’s not one email, one message, just nothing.”

Qaadir said she hopes the actions taken by PrairieCare to not make her webinar available to the public can be an opportunity for reflection within the health care community.

“The hope is that this becomes an opportunity for PrairieCare to have a dialogue with the community, listen to the concerns, and then, hopefully, rise to that moment and really show up in the community,” Qaadir said. “That’s historically what PrairieCare has done.”

Correction: A previous version of this article said that there was a speaker from Minnesota Christians for a Free Palestine. Minnesota Christians for a Free Palestine did endorse the event but weren’t represented among the speakers. Jewish Voice for Peace did speak at the event.