A wounded Palestinian boy receives care from a Doctors Without Borders staff member at a clinic in the Al-Rimal neighborhood of Gaza City, December 31, 2025. OMAR AL-QATTAA / AFP
Handicap International, Doctors Without Borders, Doctors of the World, Mercy Corps, CARE, Action Against Hunger, and more: 37 international NGOs lost their accreditation on Thursday, January 1, and now face a total ban on humanitarian operations by Israel in both Gaza and the occupied West Bank, starting on March 1. The new regulations are explicitly aimed at controlling their personnel and their freedom of expression. United Nations agencies and humanitarian actors have condemned this policy, raising concerns about the human consequences, especially in Gaza, where more than two million people live in catastrophic conditions.
"Israel's suspension of numerous aid agencies from Gaza is outrageous," responded Volker Türk, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, on Wednesday. "In Gaza in particular, as winter compounds to families' suffering, as high acute food insecurity persists and as the need for life-saving aid is as critical as ever, banning NGOs risks undermining the fragile progress made during the ceasefire. The consequences for vulnerable children, women and men will be devastating," warned the heads of key UN agencies on Wednesday.
