Throughout the Israel-Hamas War, the issue of humanitarian aid being allowed into Gaza has been one of the largest issues dominating any and all attempts at understanding the war and attempts at how Gazan civilians have been impacted by it.
This itself isn’t entirely a new issue — Israel’s longstanding blockade over Gaza and control of most of the entrances into the region have traditionally limited supplies in the area. This is further worsened by longstanding accusations that Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist organization that rules Gaza, maintains control over the aid in order to further their stranglehold on the populace.
But the humanitarian crisis that has erupted in Gaza due to the war has placed renewed focus on the issue, as has the Israeli government’s sporadic blocking or limiting of all aid.
But who is sending aid to Gaza? And what are Israel’s concerns over the aid?
Here’s everything you need to know.
Why does Gaza need humanitarian aid?
Since Hamas’s takeover of Gaza in 2007, Israel has placed severe restrictions on the movement of people and goods to and from the region.
The Jewish state maintains control of the waters around Gaza, preventing ships from approaching, as well as maintaining air superiority. While this does not in theory bar all aid from entering Gaza by sea and air, it does in practice lead to Israel having control over all aid that does.
Gaza’s border has three land crossings. Two of them, the Erez Crossing and Kerem Shalom Crossing, are both under Israeli control. The third, the Rafah Border Crossing, is on the Egyptian border, and barring brief periods of IDF control, has been administered by Egypt.
The limited ability to enter and leave Gaza has created chronic supply issues, which have been made worse by Israel limiting certain vital supplies out of concern that they could be used for non-humanitarian purposes.
Gazans have also been limited in the ability to sustain their own supplies. Fishing is highly restricted by Israeli control of a majority of the nearby waters, and according to a 2009 UN fact finding mission report, known as the Goldstone Report, the IDF caused severe damage to much of Gaza’s farmable land during Operation Cast Lead in 2008-2009. Some sources even claim that Israel has continued to spray herbicide on other farmable land in Gaza. This was confirmed by pro-Israel watchdog organization HonestReporting in 2019, which cited security concerns that terrorists could use the undergrowth to breach the Gaza border fence and attack Israel. However, that same report by HonestReporting further noted that the agricultural crisis in Gaza was may have also been influenced by Palestinians destroying Israeli agricultural infrastructure after the 2005 Disengagement, as well as faulty sewage systems polluting groundwater and water sources.
Due to these above-mentioned issues, humanitarian aid sent by trucks is crucial for civilians living in Gaza. While the exact number of trucks regularly allowed in varies yearly depending on both political and security concerns, Israel has allowed regular aid shipments into Gaza for decades. The system, however, is often criticized for not always allowing in a sufficient amount of aid, as well as limiting in what is allowed in and having an extensive ban list – in 2009, pressure from US lawmakers and cabinet members caused Israel to lift a ban on pasta and lentils, finally allowing them into Gaza, as multiple media outlets reported at the time.
Some analysts have claimed that this is a deliberate act on Israel’s part to impoverish Gaza – claims supported by diplomatic cables shared by WikiLeaks in 2011. However, the Jewish state has long since denied this, though they have conceded goals to make the socioeconomic situation in Gaza less tenable. In 2008, then-Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert said “We won’t allow for a humanitarian crisis, but have no intention of making their lives easier. And the harder their lives, excluding humanitarian damage, we will not allow them to lead a pleasant life. As far as I am concerned, all of Gaza’s residents can walk and have no fuel for their cars, as they live under a murderous regime,” according to a contemporary report by Der Spiegel.
Since October 7, 2023, Israel has further cracked down on aid trucks entering Gaza as the war intensified, attempting to cut off all Hamas efforts to resupply and maintain full security control over the region. This even included seizing control of the Rafah Border Crossing when the IDF invasion took the city in 2024. The medical system in Gaza was severely impacted by the war, with the IDF carrying out multiple strikes on Gazan hospitals, which Hamas has been accused of using both to harbor hostages taken captive on October 7 and as bases of operations.
Hundreds of thousands of Gazans have also been displaced due to the fighting as the IDF works to root out Hamas and its affiliate terrorist organizations, which have caused many to become homeless. In addition, the agricultural crisis in Gaza has gotten worse as the IDF offensives have reportedly made huge swathes of formerly farmable land unusable.
Aid was still allowed into the region barring some periods, especially following pressure from human rights groups and the international community. However, the situation remains tenuous. While the exact statistics are up for debate, as are the concerns on all sides and who exactly bears the most responsibility for it, there is undeniably a humanitarian crisis in Gaza caused by the war.
Who is sending aid to Gaza?
Traditionally, much of the aid to Gaza has been coordinated by organs of the United Nations such as the World Food Programme (WFP), Relief Works Agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), and Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), as well as help from the Red Cross, Red Crescent, World Health Organization (WHO), and other charity organizations such as World Central Kitchen, Oxfam, World Vision, and Save the Children, among others.
These organizations would work together to have aid arrive in Gaza and be distributed among the local civilians, though only after the aid was heavily screened by Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT).
A significant amount of aid into Gaza is also coordinated by private traders, which coordinate aid trucks directly and are able to navigate both the bureaucracy and the battlefield dangers. According to the Financial Times, this has skyrocketed to as much as 60% of all aid entering Gaza by August and September 2024 being from private traders. However, this “aid” is highly criticized for not being aid but being business imports merely classified as aid by Israel, with the private traders accused of taking over the food distribution network and charging exorbitant prices, rendering them unaffordable to most Gazans. Speaking to the Financial Times, COGAT confirmed that permits are given to private traders to bring aid into Gaza. Others involved with the private traders further claim that the high price is justified at least in part by the need to hire armed guards to protect the convoys from looters.
However, following numerous Israeli efforts to stymie aid in to Gaza, aid workers from charities such as World Central Kitchen being killed in the conflict, and accusations that UN bodies such as UNRWA and the Red Cross have aided and abetted Hamas, a new system was put forward by both the US and Israel.
Aid has since been moved to the private sector, specifically by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US nonprofit established in February 2025. Through working with partner organizations, the GHF will distribute aid into Gaza via distribution hubs in the region. IDF soldiers will not be part of these efforts, though they will have secured the areas. This, officials involved have explained, is to ensure that no aid will go to Hamas. The IDF further claimed that these distribution centers could supply as many as 600,000 Gazan civilians in just a week.
Also involved is Safe Reach Solutions (SRS), a private firm founded in January 2025 and run by former CIA official Philip F. Reilly, which handles the security side. An investigation by The New York Times claimed that the entire GHF plan was the brainchild of Israeli officials and US private security contractors, including Reilly, to have aid sent while circumventing traditional channels in order to further weaken Hamas’s grip.
Both GHF and SRS have come under fire for a lack of transparency, in particular regarding fundraising. Controversy erupted hours before GHF operations were slated to begin on May 26, 2025, when its CEO, Jake Wood, resigned. Later, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of having GHF and SRS both being set up as Israeli shell companies, with the Israeli government essentially bankrolling the entire private aid distribution system – though the Prime Minister’s Office denied these claims.
Why has Israel opposed humanitarian aid to Gaza?
The most commonly cited argument by Israeli officials for why it limits aid into Gaza is security concerns. Gaza, they argue, is controlled by a hostile entity in the form of Hamas, and aid could in theory be repurposed for terrorist uses.
However, since the war began, many other Israeli officials have also said that this was an effort to place further pressure on Hamas into ending the war.
Some lawmakers, such as Likud MK Tally Gottliv, expressed that limiting humanitarian aid and even inducing starvation would help Gazans turn on Hamas, which in turn could help lead to an end to the war and the freeing of the rest of the hostages taken on October 7, 2023.
Then-defense minister Yoav Gallant further declared on October 9, 2023 that Gaza would be put under siege with all aid stopped, with him further referring to Gazans as “human animals.” However, he later walked back on this statement.
Multiple Israeli human rights organizations, such as the NGO Gisha, have accused the government of a lack of transparency about which aid is being allowed in.
However, many Jewish Israelis have consistently shown opposition for aid being allowed into Gaza, as shown in polling.
One of the most notable examples of this is in the form of Tzav 9, an Israeli right-wing organization that regularly protests the distribution of aid into Gaza, including attempting to attack aid trucks or block their entry.
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