A U.S.-backed Gazan aid group meant to bypass UNRWA, the U.N. Palestinian aid agency that has faced worldwide criticism over its ties to Hamas and Hezbollah, announced Monday that it has launched a system to let families reserve aid packages before pickup.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation—created in February with backing from the Trump administration and the Israeli government to deliver aid in Gaza without relying on UNRWA—said that the voluntary program allows Gazan civilians to “reserve aid parcels in advance,” ensuring “safe, predictable access” to humanitarian aid. The system, launched on Sunday, will scale over the coming weeks and bring “more ease, dignity, and order to the collection process,” according to the foundation.
“Those who opt to participate will have their photo taken and receive an ID card with their photo and a unique number,” the foundation’s announcement went on. “A box of aid will be set aside on specific days for each participant, eliminating the need to partake in the rush.”
The news comes as UNRWA, which oversees nearly all humanitarian aid into Gaza, has long come under fire over its ties to terrorism. Trump in February said the U.N. agency has been “infiltrated” by foreign terrorist organizations. Survivors and families of victims of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack on Israel sued UNRWA earlier this month for funding and supporting Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists. In April, the Justice Department stripped UNRWA of its immunity in U.S. courts, allowing lawsuits against the agency to go forward.
A Wall Street Journal report last year, citing Israeli intelligence, found that roughly 1,200 UNRWA staffers—about 10 percent of the agency’s workforce—were linked to terrorist groups and that 49 percent of the employees had close relatives with ties to terrorism. Following the report, UNRWA spent months denying that its staffers work with Hamas before firing nine employees for participating in the October 7 attacks.
The Trump administration “has determined UNRWA is irredeemably compromised and now seeks its full dismantlement,” the State Department told Congress in July.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in the Monday announcement said that without the new reserving system, many young men would “often outpace women, children, older men, and people with disabilities to access aid, which is collected on a first-come, first-served basis.”
“This is real progress,” foundation executive director John Acree said. “It both demonstrates that GHF’s model is working and reflects our commitment to adapting to the needs of those we serve and delivering on President Trump’s call for innovation to get more humanitarian aid into the hands of the people who need it most in Gaza.”
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Author: Matthew Xiao
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