US-Israeli Gaza aid plan is catastrophic, inhumane: MSF
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MSF chief says the US-Israeli aid effort in Gaza weaponizes food, deepens suffering, and risks ethnic cleansing under the guise of humanitarian aid.
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Doctors weigh a Palestinian baby at the Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) clinic in Muwasi, near Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, Tuesday, April 8, 2025 (AP)
The Secretary-General of Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), Christopher Lockyear, issued a scathing rebuke of the US-Israeli Gaza Humanitarian Organization, labeling its aid distribution operation a “catastrophic failure” and a tool of forced displacement under a false humanitarian guise.
Following reports of chaos during an aid drop in Rafah that left dozens injured, Lockyear said that Palestinians, cut off from food, water, and medical supplies for nearly three months, are being herded behind fences to await minimal aid, in conditions that echo “inhumane treatment by Israeli authorities for over 19 months.”
According to Lockyear, the US-Israeli mechanism fails to deliver food where it is most urgently needed. Instead, supplies are channeled into zones predetermined by Israeli forces, often inaccessible to Gaza’s most vulnerable, such as the elderly and disabled. “This is not relief, it is manipulation,” he said, describing it as a calculated attempt to “simulate compliance with humanitarian law while deepening civilian suffering.”
'System was designed this way'
Lockyear dismissed claims that aid restrictions are needed to prevent diversion as “baseless.” He explained that MSF teams have been treating patients since the beginning of the war and have witnessed firsthand the widespread deprivation and urgency for supplies. “This system is not broken, it was designed this way, to justify displacement and enable a wider strategy of ethnic cleansing.”
He further highlighted the systematic throttling of the aid process itself, stating that Israeli authorities frequently allow small batches of humanitarian convoys to cross into Gaza, only to stop them arbitrarily inside the border. This deliberate bottleneck, he warned, denies essential care to women, children, and the medically vulnerable.
The MSF chief’s remarks echo calls from international legal experts who argue that such manipulative aid practices may amount to violations of international humanitarian law and contribute to war crimes in Gaza.
Gaza has become a mass grave for Palestinians
Doctors Without Borders had in April issued a statement saying "Israel's" expanding military offensive in Gaza, including airstrikes, ground operations, and naval attacks, is forcibly displacing civilians while deliberately blocking humanitarian aid, leaving Palestinians in impossible living conditions.
“Gaza has been turned into a mass grave of Palestinians and those coming to their assistance. We are witnessing in real time the destruction and forced displacement of the entire population in Gaza,” MSF's emergency coordinator in Gaza, Amande Bazerolle, stated.
“With nowhere safe for Palestinians or those trying to help them, the humanitarian response is severely struggling under the weight of insecurity and critical supply shortages, leaving people with few, if any, options for accessing care," she added.
