The World Central Kitchen (WCK) organisation announced on Wednesday that it had suspended operations in Gaza. The charity said in a statement that its work “cannot continue without Israel’s permission to bring in humanitarian aid.”
After distributing more than 130 million meals and baking 26 million loaves of bread over the past 18 months, the WCK no longer has supplies to cook or bake bread in Gaza.
On its website, the organisation noted that it is continuing its work in Gaza to provide Palestinian families with water, but after Israel closed the border crossings, it has become “impossible to replenish the food supplies we use to feed hundreds of thousands of Gazans every day,” using alternative fuels and ingredients to save food and resources.
Last year, seven WCK employees were killed in an Israeli strike in the Gaza Strip. Israel said it attacked the organisation’s convoy because it suspected a terrorist was travelling with it.
Since early May, humanitarian aid deliveries to the sector have been completely halted. Israel is now preparing to launch a new plan to control and restrict food distribution within Gaza, which will be implemented through American contractors.
The plan is expected to begin at the end of May, after Donald Trump’s visit to the Middle East. According to the plan, about 60 trucks with food and essential items will be allowed into Gaza daily. This is less than 10 per cent of the aid that was entering the enclave before the ceasefire. All cargoes en route from Israel to Gaza will be inspected by IDF soldiers and then sent to humanitarian aid centres set up in the south of the enclave, guarded by American contractors.
According to available information, six such centres are initially planned to be opened in the Gaza Strip. All of them will be located in the south, which means that the entire population must be concentrated there. Each centre will serve five to six thousand families, who will receive necessary food and hygiene supplies once or twice a week.
All UN agencies and non-governmental organisations involved in organising humanitarian aid in Gaza have refused to participate in the implementation of the Israeli-American plan, which suggests that the project does not comply with humanitarian principles and, on the contrary, involves the use of food as a means of punishment, blackmail and destruction of the Palestinians.
Former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis wrote his commentary on the issue on X:
“And there you have it: Israel has confessed, indeed heralded, its intent to complete the Gazan genocide. And the EU? Mrs von der Leyen? Our great and good leaders? They are consenting through a studied silence. 80 yrs after its defeat, Nazism in back.”
