Doctors Without Borders Continue Humanitarian Work in Gaza Despite Being Banned by Israel
Gaza City, Palestine — Israel has banned Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières, MSF) from providing healthcare and humanitarian aid to Palestinians in the war-torn Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank. Despite this ban, MSF says it “remains committed to providing services in Palestine” and as of April 13, MSF has even resumed core medical activities at Nasser Hospital.
MSF is one of 37 humanitarian organizations that Israel has banned from working in Palestinian territories.
Since January 1, 2026, Israel has blocked all aid and new international staff from getting to MSF in Gaza. And as of March 1, Israel forced all MSF international workers out of Gaza.
Unicorn Riot visited the headquarters of Gaza’s Doctors Without Borders in late January and heard from MSF’s coordinator in Gaza and the mother of a young girl who said MSF saved her daughter’s foot after an airstrike, see the video below.
“Dire” is the word that Hunter McGovern, MSF-France’s Project Coordinator in Gaza, chose to describe the medical and healthcare situation in the Gaza Strip. McGovern spoke to UR about the importance of the medical services that they provide and how they were already dealing with supply shortages from Israel’s total blockade. He was later expelled from the Strip along with other international workers.
MSF says the org is still “fully registered to work in Palestine, under [their] registration with the Palestinian Authority.”
However, Israel, who is illegally occupying Palestinian lands, announced the ban as a national security measure on Dec. 30, 2025. They then went on to de-register 37 NGOs from operating in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
Rocío Simón Martínez, MSF nursing manager, said that NGOs leaving Gaza “will have catastrophic consequences for people who depend almost entirely on humanitarian assistance. […] The needs are enormous.”
While at MSF’s location in Gaza City, Umm Firas Jundiya told UR that because of MSF’s excellent service, her daughter’s foot is recovering. “Before we went to Doctors Without Borders, the doctors at Al-Shifa Hospital told us her foot would have to be amputated. But after transferring her to Doctors Without Borders, they treated her.”
Jundiya’s daughter, Jouri Jundiya, is eight years old. She had her foot run over by a truck while she was running away from an airstrike. She was taken to Al-Shifa Hospital, which was ill-equipped to treat her daughter and had told her that she may need amputation.
Al-Shifa Hospital, the largest hospital in Gaza, has been repeatedly bombed by Israel and was also the site of mass killings and atrocities carried out by Israeli forces. See our special from last March when families attempted to retrieve the bodies of dozens of Palestinians killed outside of Al-Shifa.
Regarding MSF, Jundiya said “Doctors Without Borders is the one treating us and helping us right now. If they close, we will lose my daughter’s foot because they are the only ones treating her.”
Beyond her daughter’s care, it will be “catastrophic” for the whole population if MSF closes, Jundiya said, “because of the many injuries we’re seeing and the excellent treatment they provide.”
Help support Unicorn Riot contributor Mohamed El Saife as he seeks to get his family out of Gaza.
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