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As Gaza enters the bleakest period of winter, children are dying of hypothermia, drowning in flooded camps and burning to death as their families try to cook in flimsy tents. Israel destroyed nine out of 10 homes over more than two years of war. Camped amid the ruins, Palestinians struggle against strong winds, heavy rain and freezing temperatures. Aid deliveries resumed following the ceasefire, staving off the famine that had taken hold in parts of the territory, but remain wholly insufficient: 1.6 million people face acute food insecurity. The sanitation infrastructure has collapsed.
The UK, Canada, Japan, France and six other nations have jointly warned that the situation is catastrophic. Yet Israel is now deepening one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. On Tuesday, it announced that it is deregistering 37 NGOs active in Gaza. They must cease all operations there by 1 March unless they meet its new “security and transparency standards” – including by disclosing the personal details of staff. Many of the listed groups are among the best-regarded in their field, including Oxfam, Médecins Sans Frontières and the Norwegian Refugee Council.
Volker Türk, the UN human rights chief, was right to describe this as outrageous – and as part of a pattern of unlawful restrictions on humanitarian access. Israeli NGOs have warned that it breaks the principles of independence and neutrality for humanitarian organisations.
Israel says that the measures are necessary to prevent NGOs employing staff with links to extremist groups. It has repeatedly claimed that Hamas has infiltrated aid organisations and exploited international aid, while providing little evidence. Given the many relief workers arbitrarily detained and killed since the war began, the demand for staff lists has prompted alarm. Israel has reportedly refused requests for meetings on the issue.
Meanwhile, as Israel bars life-saving supplies such as tent poles and generators from humanitarian shipments, claiming they could be exploited for military purposes, it allows traders to bring such items into the territory. While ordinary Palestinians suffer, players inside and outside the territory profit financially and politically. US officers in Israel have reportedly urged that key items, including tent poles, be removed from the blacklist – without success.
In Washington, there appears to be growing frustration at Benjamin Netanyahu’s attempts to stall the peace process. Yet while Donald Trump said he wanted to move to the second phase as quickly as possible when he met the Israeli prime minister on Monday – and warned there would be “hell to pay” if Hamas did not disarm very rapidly – he appeared relaxed about Israel’s reluctance to withdraw from the half of Gaza that it controls.
Far from “[living] up to the plan, 100%”, as Mr Trump claimed, it is clear that Israel is not complying with a deal that Palestinians greeted with tentative relief only as the alternative to continued war. If he wants to be lauded as a dealmaker, he should enforce it. Ensuring relief to those in desperate conditions is not an act of munificence subject to inclination, nor a clause for negotiation. It is not merely what basic humanity and decency require; international law demands that the parties to conflict facilitate aid. Israel’s allies were slowly pushed into acknowledging and challenging the carnage in Gaza. They must not drag their feet again. It is not bad weather but bad faith that is the greatest threat to those now struggling to survive.
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