The hypocrisy and inaction of the European Union and its member states have allowed Israel to freely continue its massacre of Palestinians in Gaza with total impunity, said Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) during a press conference in Brussels today.
MSF calls for impartial, needs-based aid to be facilitated into the Gaza Strip at scale, the protection of civilians, and the immediate restoration of a sustained ceasefire. European governments must act decisively to expedite this, said MSF.
For more than 20 months, Israeli authorities and forces have inflicted a punishing campaign, including large-scale forced displacement and ethnic cleansing against Palestinians in Gaza. On a daily basis, MSF’s teams witness patterns consistent with genocide through deliberate actions by Israeli forces, including mass killings, the destruction of vital civilian infrastructure, and blockades choking off access to food, water, medicines, and other essential humanitarian supplies. Israel is systematically destroying the conditions necessary for Palestinian life. Gaza’s homes, hospitals, markets, water networks, roads, and power grids have been demolished—not by disregard but by design.
Ending Gaza's suffering demands more than empty rhetoric
The European Union and European governments have the political, economic, and diplomatic means to exert real pressure on Israel to stop this assault and open Gaza’s border crossings to unhindered humanitarian aid. These are not theoretical instruments. They can be effectively mobilized in defense of international law and to protect civilians.
However, up to this point, the EU and its member states appear to have abdicated their political leadership to do so. Worse, recent statements made by European States critical of how the war is being waged highlights their hypocrisy as they continue to supply the weapons being used to kill, maim, and burn people who end up in the hospitals where MSF is working.
“The war in Gaza is one of the most egregious, deadly, and ruthless wars waged on a people of our time,” said Christopher Lockyear, MSF secretary general. “It is an orchestrated massacre of Palestinian people. It is purposeful ethnic cleansing. Stopping this requires political courage, legal responsibility, and moral commitment. The scale of suffering in Gaza demands more than empty rhetoric.”
The weaponization of aid for Gaza
Aid has been weaponized, used as leverage, conditioned, or blocked entirely. Since the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation launched its activities on May 27—as part of the US-Israeli scheme to instrumentalize aid—hundreds of Palestinians have been treated in hospitals, and scores have been killed after being shot at these aid distribution sites while waiting to receive the basic necessities for survival.
“The imposed system of aid delivery is not only a failure, but it is dehumanizing and dangerous,” Lockyear said. “It exposes thousands of Palestinians to unnecessary risks, leading to bloodshed that can be avoided if humanitarian organizations are allowed to provide aid impartially and safely, at the necessary scale that is so desperately needed in Gaza.”
From left: A woman forages mallow to eat during the months-long total blockade that cut off access to food supplies; children wait in line for food at a community kitchen in northern Gaza in February. Palestine 2025 © Nour Alsaqqa/MSF
Today, Nasser Hospital, southern Gaza’s main referral hospital for thousands of patients in the area, is barely able to continue working due to repeated evacuation orders and movement restrictions on staff and patients. In recent weeks, MSF teams admitted over 500 patients requiring medical care to the hospital, while supporting the hospital’s medical staff to respond to repeated mass casualty influxes from constant bombings and attacks.
“Humanitarian organizations have set up makeshift hospitals to fill the gap, but they can in no way replace regular hospitals,” Lockyear said. “The remaining hospitals must be protected, and the entry of aid facilitated. Failure to do so will cost more lives.”
Needed now: Immediate and unconditional ceasefire
MSF, like many organizations, has repeatedly called for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire, unfettered humanitarian access, and respect for international humanitarian law (IHL)—including the protection of medical staff and facilities. Since October 2023, MSF staff and patients in Gaza have been forced to leave at least 18 different health facilities and have endured 50 violent incidents, which include airstrikes against hospitals, tank shells being fired at agreed deconflicted shelters, ground offensives into medical centers, and convoys fired upon. Eleven MSF colleagues have been killed.
Several governments continue to express concerns about the horrific situation in Gaza, but their statements that invoke concern with adherence to IHL are shrouded in hypocrisy as they continue to send the arms that kill and maim the children MSF teams treat.
“What people are experiencing in Gaza is beyond unbearable. It must stop now,” Lockyear said. “As this military onslaught against a besieged people rages on, the hypocrisy of EU states who speak but don’t act is more obvious by the day.”
