(Originally published by The Lancet on March 31, 2026.)

In late November, 2025, five human rights organisations petitioned the Israeli High Court of Justice to allow for the evacuation of patients from the Gaza Strip into the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Gaza’s health-care infrastructure faces near-total breakdown, with WHO reporting that only 18 of the 36 hospitals in Gaza are partially functioning. Essential services, including chemotherapy, intensive care, paediatric care, advanced imaging, and oncological surgery, are almost entirely inaccessible. The situation has been exacerbated by Israel’s recent decision to block numerous leading international aid organisations from providing relief in the Gaza Strip on the grounds that they have refused to adhere to newly imposed requirements to list all employees by name to Israeli authorities, which has drawn significant criticism from the humanitarian sector and several of Israel’s allies.

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