This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.
Israel is banning dozens of international humanitarian organizations from operating in the Gaza Strip starting Thursday, January 1st. The groups banned include some of the best-known humanitarian aid groups in the world, including Doctors Without Borders — Médecins Sans Frontières, MSF — Oxfam and the Norwegian Refugee Council, among many others. Israeli authorities say the groups did not meet new registration requirements that include sharing detailed information about Palestinian and international staff, funding and operations. Israel continued to claim, without evidence, Hamas is infiltrating the distribution of aid.
In a statement issued in anticipation of Israel’s announcement, MSF said, quote, “If Israeli authorities revoke MSF’s access to Gaza in 2026, a large portion of people in Gaza will lose access to critical medical care, water, and lifesaving support. MSF’s activities serve nearly half a million people in Gaza through our vital support to the destroyed health system,” unquote.
For more, we’re joined in Jerusalem by Shaina Low of the Norwegian Refugee Council. She’s communications adviser. She’s in daily touch with her colleagues in Gaza and has spent much of the last 15 years working on Palestine.
Shaina, welcome back to Democracy Now! Can you explain what’s going to happen tomorrow and why it’s happening?
SHAINA LOW: Well, thank you, Amy.
In terms of why it’s happening, I think that’s probably the easiest way to start, because we aren’t really sure what the consequences will be, starting tomorrow. In terms of why it’s happening, this is part of Israel’s continuous campaign, that we’ve seen since October 7th, to obstruct principled humanitarian actors from operating in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. We’ve faced obstruction after obstruction. Since March 2nd, dozens of NGOs, like the Norwegian Refugee Council, have been essentially barred from bringing in any aid into Gaza. We haven’t been able to get in a single pallet directly by NRC since — in 10 months, basically. And so, this is just one more step to push out principled humanitarian actors, particularly those that speak out on behalf of the people who we’re there to serve, call for accountability for rights violations and violations of international law.
And we know what happens when international, principled, experienced humanitarian agencies are sidelined. We saw that this year with the GHF, where hundreds of people, thousands of people were shot, injured and killed seeking food for their families. This is what’s going to happen as Israel continues to try and block and obstruct our response.
We know that, at least starting tomorrow, we will no longer be able to bring in international aid workers into Gaza. We have, at any particular time, around a dozen international staff supporting nearly 70 — around 70 local staff and 200 daily workers in Gaza who are the backbone of our response. And so, while we will miss, and, of course, it will be a loss to not be able to have aid workers there on the — international aid workers there on the ground supporting our teams, our teams remain committed to serving people, not just in Gaza, but throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory, with or without international presence.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Shaina, what specifically are these new registration requirements of the Israeli government on — for information on staffs, funding and operations, that you have deep concerns about?
SHAINA LOW: Well, there were two issues with the Israeli registration process. And this is, I should note, a new process. Prior to this being implemented in March, organizations like NRC registered — we registered more than 15 years ago — and were able to operate in perpetuity, unless — unless the Israeli authorities took some type of action. Now they’ve implemented new rules that require agencies to reapply for registration every three years, putting us under their scrutiny. And there were two major issues with this process.
The first was the request for staff lists of our Palestinian staff. Now, we’re dealing with one of the parties to the conflict, and not just any party to the conflict, but one that has killed hundreds of aid workers in Gaza over the last two years. So, for us, it’s a security concern. And it’s also a legal concern, because those of us that are domiciled in the European Union or receive funding from the EU or EU member states are subject to very strict data protection laws, and to disclose our staff’s private information would violate those laws that we are contractually obligated to abide by.
There is a second issue, which we didn’t even get to in this process, around the criteria by which the Israeli authorities are evaluating us, which is arbitrary and highly politicized, including saying that any organization that engages in, quote-unquote, “delegitimization of Israel” could be — would be subject to having their registration revoked or not issued. Now, that term, “delegitimization,” is very vague. We don’t know what it means. But what we understand it to mean is a way to target organizations, like NRC, like Oxfam, like MSF, like our peers, who speak out about what we’re seeing, who talk about the violations we’re seeing, and call for accountability.
And so, these are the main issues that we are facing. I think it’s important to note that we know of some organizations that were reregistered even without submitting staff lists. So we know that this is being used as merely an excuse to target those of us that speak out and are fighting on behalf — or, are fighting for the right to protection of the people that we’re there to serve.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Shaina, Palestinians are not just under attack in Gaza, but could you talk about what is happening in the West Bank, especially with the stepped-up settler attacks, and, of course, in early December, the Israeli Cabinet approving a proposal for the construction of 19 new illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank?
SHAINA LOW: Well, as you said in my introduction, I’ve been working in the Occupied Palestinian Territory off and on for more than 15 years. And the situation that I am witnessing here is — and that we are witnessing, is by far the worst we’ve ever seen.
We’re facing a massive displacement crisis across the West Bank. We have over 30,000 Palestinians who have been forcibly displaced from refugee camps in the northern West Bank, unable to return. All signs indicate that Israel is using their displacement as a means of erasing the refugee issue, only setting conditions where return would be subject to, basically, removing the status as refugee camps and turning these camps into basically neighborhoods or extensions of the cities that they’re a part of.
And we’ve seen unbelievable number of settler attacks, just over around 260 in October alone. This is 50% of the total attacks that we witnessed in 2021. So we’ve seen settler attacks skyrocket over the last several years. This is not an accident. This is government policy. Israel is arming these settlers. Oftentimes these settlers are attacking vulnerable Palestinian communities under the protection, or even with the participation, of the Israeli military. When Palestinian communities call the Israeli police asking for help and for protection, which Israel is obligated to do under international law, the police don’t come, or, in some cases, they even threaten to detain or arrest the Palestinians who are seeking protection.
We’ve seen 85 communities in the last three years face displacement, and dozens of them have been completely displaced, erased from the map. And meanwhile, we’ve seen the Netanyahu government work to quickly expand its settlement footprint. We saw the approval of the E1 plans east of Jerusalem. We’ve seen now, just in the last several weeks, the announcement of 19 new settlements, including the reestablishment of five settlements that were removed 20 years ago during the Gaza disengagement, that will be reestablished.
What we’ve seen is a government that is out of control in terms of its consolidation of control of the West Bank. It’s advancing its annexation agenda. And at the same time, we are witnessing Palestinians continue to be displaced and continually to be forced, just as we’ve seen in Gaza, into smaller and smaller spaces.
AMY GOODMAN: Shaina Low, we want to thank you for being with us, speaking to us from Jerusalem, communications adviser for the Norwegian Refugee Council, which, along with dozens of other groups, including the MSF, Doctors Without Borders, have been banned by Israel from the Occupied Territories.
Next up, at midnight New York time today, democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani will be sworn in as mayor of New York. Stay with us.
