August 05, 2025
Visual by MENA Rights Group, incorporating images © Al Mezan Center for Human Rights.
Gaza/Geneva, 5 August 2025 — Al Mezan Center for Human Rights (Al Mezan) and MENA Rights Group (MRG) have documented the cases of five Palestinians, including a minor, who disappeared as they were attempting to collect humanitarian aid at various Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) aid distribution points. Their cases were filed with the United Nations (UN) Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID). In three cases, the Israeli army acknowledged their detention.
Among the cases is that of Abdulraouf al-Hems, aged 16, and Ahmed al-Akhras, aged 20, who both disappeared on 21 June 2025 at a GHF aid distribution point on al-Tina street in the Morag area in northern Rafah. Following an inquiry by Al Mezan’s legal team, Israeli authorities denied having them in their custody.
The Israeli army, however, acknowledged the detention of three men: Ramy Omar (42), who disappeared at GHF aid distribution site in the al-Alam area in Rafah on 17 June 2025, and Majd al-Jazzar (21) and Ashraf Abdeen (31), who disappeared at a distribution point in the al-Shakoush area of the Saudi neighbourhood in Rafah, on 9 and 11 July 2025, respectively. The Israeli army refused to disclose their place of detention and denied them their right to access legal counsel, placing them in incommunicado detention and at heightened risk of torture and ill-treatment. Omar was denied access to a lawyer until 2 August, and no information has been provided regarding when, if at all, al-Jazzar and Abdeen may be granted a visit.
In their appeal, Al Mezan and MRG urged the UN WGEID to intervene with the Israeli authorities to clarify the fate and whereabouts of the five disappeared Palestinians, and to immediately release those detained.
The NGOs also requested that the UN Working Group address a communication to the GHF, and to the relevant U.S. authorities, in light of the mounting number of cases of enforced disappearances occurring at the aid distribution sites operated by the U.S.-Israeli backed organisation.
These five documented cases are only the tip of the iceberg and reveal yet another disturbing pattern of grave human rights violations committed by Israeli authorities in Gaza: abductions of Palestinian civilians seeking humanitarian aid at distribution sites operated by the GHF.
Issam Younis, Director of Al Mezan Center for Human Rights stated:
“Not only does the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation gravely violate basic humanitarian principles, it is also a death trap that is being used to perpetuate famine, one of the tools used by Israel to carry out their genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. This degrading and abhorrent mechanism must be dismantled immediately and replaced by a UN-led initiative in coordination with UNRWA, which has an extensive history of efficient work as the international organisation entrusted with the relief of the Palestinian people.”
The GHF is a U.S. and Israeli-backed organisation criticised by the UN and civil society organisations for operating military-controlled aid distribution sites where Palestinians seeking humanitarian aid have faced daily gun fires and mass casualties. Since the GHF started operating in May 2025 until July, over 700 Palestinians have been killed at the vicinity of GHF sites, and almost 4,000 have been injured.
The GHF’s militarised aid distribution system contributes to manipulating humanitarian access and using starvation as a method of warfare and a tool of genocide. The current man-made famine devastating Gaza is the result of a deliberate, calculated Israeli policy, including a blockade on the entry of food, water, medicine, fuel, and other humanitarian supplies. It deliberately imposes conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza.
The GHF must be immediately dismantled, and delivery of humanitarian aid must be returned to a unified, UN-led coordination mechanism, grounded in international humanitarian law and inclusive of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), Palestinian civil society, and the wider humanitarian community. Israel’s siege on Gaza must be lifted and the right of civilians to safely access aid and receive protection must be upheld, in full compliance with international law.
