Israel to ban access to Gaza for dozens of humanitarian organizations starting in the New Year

Shaina Low had hoped to see aid trucks arriving in Gaza in 2026. Instead, she says, millions of dollars of supplies will sit in warehouses while Palestinians suffer.

Low is a spokesperson for the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), one of more than two dozen humanitarian organizations that Israel is banning from the Gaza Strip, starting Thursday, for failing to comply with new registration rules.

Israel says the rules are aimed at preventing Hamas and other militant groups from infiltrating humanitarian organizations. But banned organizations say the rules will have horrific consequences for a region already facing deadly floods as he tries to rebuild himself just a few months later a fragile ceasefire.

“What is so frustrating for us as aid workers is knowing that we have resources available outside and that we just can’t reach people with what we have because Israel has continually, for over two years, stopped us from getting our supplies in, stopped us from expanding, stopped us from reaching communities in need,” Low said. As it happens guest host Paul Hunter.

“We therefore view this news regarding registration as simply another element of this obstruction. »

Controversial new registration rules

Israel announced new rules earlier this year requiring humanitarian organizations to register the names of their workers and provide details of funding and operations in order to continue working in Gaza.

Israel’s Diaspora Ministry said more than 30 groups – about 15 percent of organizations operating in Gaza – had failed to meet their obligations and would be suspended.

These include Doctors Without Borders, World Vision International and several regional branches of Oxfam, including Oxfam Quebec.

“The message is clear: humanitarian aid is welcome – the exploitation of humanitarian settings for terrorist purposes is not,” said Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli.

When asked why the NRC doesn’t just give Israel the information it wants, Low says it’s not that simple.

Providing a list of names would violate confidentiality rules in several European countries in which the organization operates, she said. Additionally, she says it would put NRC workers at risk.

“Israel is a party to the conflict. And not only are they a party to the conflict, but they have killed hundreds of aid workers in Gaza,” she said. “So, for us, it’s a risk to communicate the names of our collaborators to them.”

The United Nations reported in October that at least 562 aid workers have been killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023.

“There is no evidence that the NRC or any of these other organizations have any links to armed groups,” she said.

“We view this as simply part of a campaign to delegitimize legitimate humanitarian actors who have been operating in the occupied Palestinian territory for decades. »

In announcing the bans, Israel pointed the finger at Médecins Sans Frontières, also known by its French name Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), accusing the charity of failing to respond to Israeli claims that some of its workers were affiliated with Hamas or Islamic Jihad.

“MSF will never knowingly employ people engaged in military activities,” it said in a statement.

MSF says Israel’s decision will have a catastrophic impact on its work in Gaza, where the organization provides around 20 percent of hospital beds and a third of births.

The new regulations also include ideological demands, including the disqualification of organizations that have called for a boycott against Israel, denied the attack carried out by Hamas against Israel on October 7, 2023, or expressed support for any of the international legal proceedings against Israeli soldiers or leaders.

Concretely, what does a ban mean?

The decision not to renew the humanitarian groups’ licenses means offices in Israel and East Jerusalem will close and the organizations will not be able to send international staff or aid to Gaza.

But several groups, including NCR, have said they will continue to run programs inside Gaza with local staff.

The Israeli defense body that oversees humanitarian aid to Gaza, COGAT, said the organizations on the list contribute less than 1 percent of total aid to the Gaza Strip, and that aid will continue to flow in from more than 20 organizations that have received permits to continue operating.

But affected groups say the timing of the ban, in the heart of Gaza’s flood-prone winter, will have deadly consequences.

“We have hundreds of thousands of people living in overcrowded displacement sites where sewage is out in the open, garbage and solid waste accumulate, and floodwaters have no place to go other than the tents,” Low said.

According to the United Nations, 1.9 million people – or 90 percent of the population – have been displaced in Gaza over the past two years.

Since January, Israel has also banned the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, the main UN agency working with the Palestinians, accusing it of being infiltrated by Hamas. The UN denies it.

Canada issued a joint statement with several other countries on Tuesday criticizing Israel’s “new restrictive demands” and calling on the country to allow NGOs and UN partners to operate in Gaza.

“[We] express our deep concerns about the further deterioration of the humanitarian situation in Gaza, which remains catastrophic,” reads the statement foreign ministers from Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Japan, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

Low believes it is time for the international community to do “more than just issue statements of condemnation.”

“Israel, as the occupying power, has an obligation to provide for the basic needs of people living under its control or to facilitate humanitarian assistance,” she said.

“What we have seen time and time again over the past two years is Israel failing to meet its obligations, and yet we have seen very little action from states to hold them accountable for these violations. »