Conan O’Brien says Safed doctors treating Syrians deserve Nobel Prize

TV personality Conan O’Brien, who is filming a documentary film Conan in Israel, which will be screened in the US later this month, told medical teams at Safed’s Ziv Medical Center that they “deserve a Nobel Peace Prize” for their treatment of Syrian wounded.

He first spoke to Dr. Alejandro Roizentol, head of the oral and maxillofacial department, and then to Fares Issa, who is in charge of sociopsychological care for the Syrian civilians of all ages wounded in the civil war. He also talked to the Syrian patients themselves and asked how they felt when their lives were saved by people they had perceived as an enemy, and he let one child play with his smartphone.

“I am amazed and excited by what is being done here at Ziv for the sake of people from a neighboring country and an enemy, and I think you are the ones who need to receive the Nobel Peace Prize,” O’Brien told the medical teams.

In the last four years, Ziv and the Western Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya have been providing life-saving medical care to a few thousand civilians whom the IDF has taken from the Syrian border to receive treatment.

Roizentol said his visit symbolizes the world’s recognition of the tragedy taking place in Syria and the humanitarian activities of Ziv and the State of Israel.

“I am only one of the many excellent and moral staffers who carry out humanitarian principles and the doctors’ oath to reach out to anyone in need,” he said.

After the visit, O’Brien toured the northern border with the IDF.