Table of Contents
Palestinians, including children, who are struggling to access food gather to receive hot meals distributed by a charity organisation at Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza City, Gaza on December 30, 2025 [Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu].
- Israel says it will suspend more than three dozen humanitarian organisations, including Doctors Without Borders (MSF), for failing to meet its new rules for aid groups working in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip.
- MSF – one of the largest medical groups operating in Gaza, where the health sector has been targeted and largely destroyed – says Israel’s decision will have a catastrophic effect on its work in the enclave, where it supports about 20 percent of hospital beds and one-third of births. The organisation also denied Israel’s accusations about its staff.
- Dr James Smith, a British physician who has volunteered in Gaza and then was denied re-entry by Israeli authorities, has told Al Jazeera that the “ruthless” restrictions on aid organisations will make the “already horrific” humanitarian crisis “even more horrific”.
- Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza has killed at least 71,266 Palestinians and wounded 171,222 since it began in October 2023. A total of 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the October 7, 2023, attacks, and about 200 were taken captive.
The Israeli army conducts an operation in the Qabatiya district of Jenin, West Bank, on December 27, 2025 [Nedal Eshtayah/Anadolu].
New registration system for aid groups aims to ban their work in Gaza
In an attempt to legitimise the notorious aid agency backed by the US, GHF, Israeli authorities have introduced a new registration system for international organisations delivering aid to Gaza, asking them for a list of their full employees and many other details.
These organisations say this information goes against EU data protection laws and is not a legitimate request, but instead aims to get them banned from working in Gaza.
Some of these aid groups have offices in the occupied West Bank and have already been going through severe limitations, including limiting the visas for international staff.
Palestinian organisations are also facing limitations to their work. I’m standing in front of the building of the Palestinian organisation Health Work Committee, one of many Palestinian organisations that Israeli forces have shut down, citing security concerns.
Photos: Displaced Palestinians prepare to usher in 2026 in Gaza
Gaza’s cancer patients facing ‘death sentence’
Dr Mohammed Abu Nada, medical director of the Gaza Ministry of Health’s Cancer Centre, says his patients in the enclave are staring down “a slow death sentence”.
“The severe shortage of cancer medications, the denial of diagnostic services, and the continued closure of crossings preventing their travel abroad for treatment complete the triangle of death that threatens their lives at any moment,” he said in a statement published on the ministry’s Telegram page.
“The only way to save their lives is for them to leave the Strip for treatment,” the doctor added, calling for “urgent action” to ferry more cancer patients abroad.
In March, Israel blew up Gaza’s only specialised cancer treatment hospital.
UNRWA says Palestinians in Gaza suffer from cold as Israel curbs aid
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees says its supplies are ready to enter Gaza amid heavy rain and strong winds that have battered the Palestinian enclave, but Israeli authorities are not allowing it access.
In its latest operational update, UNRWA said food parcels enough for 1.1 million people had been stored at the border, in addition to flour for 2.1 million individuals and shelter supplies for hundreds of thousands.
The Israeli authorities have not granted the agency’s international staff visas or permits to enter the occupied Palestinian territory, including Gaza, since the end of January. They also continue to block UNRWA from bringing humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.
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A consortium of international and local NGOs has called on Israel to reconsider its suspension of 37 organisations.
The Humanitarian Country Team, which coordinates decisions across UN agencies and NGOs working in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, said it was “urging the Israeli authorities to reconsider” the move.
International NGOs, the group said, “are an essential part of the life-saving humanitarian operation” in the occupied Palestinian territory.
A Palestinian mother takes care of the babies as her family of six struggles to survive in a worn-out tent under harsh winter conditions in the Yarmouk camp in Gaza City, December 29, 2025 [Hamza ZH Qraiqea/Anadolu] Israeli settlers destroy crops in West Bank’s Jordan Valley
Local sources have told the Wafa news agency that Israeli settlers destroyed crops across a large swath of agricultural land overnight.
They attacked “dozens of dunams” in al-Farisya village in the northern Jordan Valley, Wafa reported.
The northern Jordan Valley has seen an escalation in settler attacks in recent months. Last month, Israeli forces sent heavy reinforcements into the area and sealed off large parts of the Tubas governorate.
Suspension of aid organisations to further isolate Palestinians in Gaza
The suspension and withdrawal of aid organisations from Gaza will further isolate Palestinians from the outside world. Beyond the material that is brought here and provided by these organisations, there is a broader consequence: Visibility and accountability.
For two years, these organisations have helped document the genocidal acts unfolding and maintain the connection between Gaza and the outside world. Forcing them out and suspending their operations means further isolating Palestinians from the outside world so that their suffering becomes easier to overlook.
That’s the point that the Israeli military is after. The Israeli military has often publicly expressed frustration at the United Nations for impeding and hindering its operations on the ground.
It’s not the first time we see this happen. Over the course of the past two years, Israel has been after UNRWA’s relief programmes; it has vilified the UN agency, its relief programmes and staff on the ground, to the point where operations became very limited.
The creation of restrictive military zones by the Israeli military in more than 55 percent of the Gaza Strip also prevented organisations from delivering aid.
Two Palestinians severely beaten by Israeli forces in West Bank
Israeli forces have raided multiple towns across the occupied West Bank, severely beating at least two Palestinians and arresting four more, according to the Wafa news agency.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society confirmed that its crews transported the injured Palestinians from the village of Jaba in Jenin governorate to a hospital after soldiers beat them.
Forces also stormed multiple homes in Jaba and detained a large number of residents for field interrogations.
Meanwhile, in Kafr al-Labad village in Tulkarem governorate, Israeli soldiers arrested three men after raiding their homes.
In Beit Fajjar town in Bethlehem governorate, soldiers fanned out across multiple neighbourhoods to raid homes, making at least one arrest.
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2h ago(06:45 GMT)
Palestinian Foreign Ministry condemns Israel’s move to bar aid groups from Gaza
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates has issued a statement in which it “strongly condemns” Israel’s move to issue new registration rules for relief agencies that could cut off life-saving assistance for hundreds of thousands in Gaza.
“Israel has no sovereignty over the occupied Palestinian territory, including Jerusalem,” the ministry said, adding that the work of relief agencies is welcomed by Palestinians.
The ministry said preventing those organisations from operating constitutes a breach of international law, including an advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) stating that Israel has an obligation to ensure the “basic needs” of the population in Gaza are met.
“No entity has the right to stop their services or obstruct their work,” the ministry said. “Israel does not want any witnesses to its crimes, nor does it want institutions that support the Palestinian people and prevent Israel from implementing its colonial project aimed at destroying the lives of the Palestinian people.”
Which organizations are being suspended?
Israel says 37 organizations have failed to meet its new rules for aid groups working in the Gaza Strip, and are suspended starting January 1.
The most prominent organisations – which provide essential medical care, food and children’s services – include:
- Doctors Without Borders
- Norwegian Refugee Council
- International Rescue Committee
- Caritas
- Oxfam
- ActionAid
- Action Against Hunger
- CARE
Israel’s ban on aid groups to have ‘horrific’, ‘immediate’ consequences on Gaza, doctor says
Dr James Smith, an emergency physician who has volunteered in Gaza, has pushed back against Israel’s claim that the newly suspended aid groups manage a small number of programmes as “misinformation”.
“A situation that is already horrific will be made even more horrific. The changes will be immediate, and they will be ruthless,” he said.
The move is “an extension of Israel’s longstanding strategy of titrating humanitarian access and humanitarian services as a core pillar of the occupation and of the genocide”, Smith said. “Israel wants to exert totalising control over all aspects of Palestinian life, not only in Gaza but throughout occupied Palestine.”
Recap of recent developments
- Dozens of international aid groups are at risk of deregistration, potentially forcing closures or restrictions on operating in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, if they do not comply with new criteria set by Israeli authorities.
- The United Kingdom, Canada, France and others say in a joint statement that the humanitarian situation in Gaza has worsened again and is of serious concern.
- US President Donald Trump says Hamas will have “hell to pay” if it fails to disarm in Gaza and insisted that Israel had “lived up” to the truce plan, as he presented a united front with Benjamin Netanyahu during the Israeli prime minister’s visit to Florida.
- Trump also says he hopes to reach phase two of the Gaza plan “very quickly”.
- Israel defends its formal recognition of the self-declared Republic of Somaliland, but several countries at the United Nations question whether the move aims to relocate Palestinians from Gaza or to establish military bases.
View of humanitarian supplies for Gaza, with the logos of Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, and the World Health Organization, stored at Egyptian Red Crescent warehouses in the Egyptian border town of El Arish, Egypt, April 8, 2025 [Benoit Tessier/Pool via Reuters] Welcome
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