As Israeli settlers and armed forces increase attacks across the West Bank of Palestine unabated, Palestinians are struggling to access basic healthcare due to restrictions, insecurity, and systematic violence. Despite Israeli authorities limiting our capacity to respond to major health concerns, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has expanded mobile clinic activities in Hebron, including to support people with their mental health needs that are driven by intentional violence.  

Violence driving physical and mental health needs

Repeated attacks, displacement, movement restrictions, and deteriorating living conditions are impacting people’s physical and mental health in Hebron.

Ismail Ibrahim, a patient from outside Yatta, a city in Hebron governorate, says he has been attacked three times in recent months.

“Settlers sprayed pepper spray on my face while I was working in an olive grove the family had been raising for years,” he says. “They grazed animals among the olive trees, damaging the land, destroying and breaking the trees. When the police arrived, they told us we weren’t allowed to speak to the settlers.”

“Every day the situation becomes worse,” says Ibrahim. “Many people in our community have been attacked. Once they came at night and stole 200 sheep. They cut the gate to the sheep enclosure. We managed to recover only a few.”

At least 77 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces and settlers this year in the West Bank, according to United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).[1] This figure is already higher than the whole of 2025.  Since March, between 17% and 38% of our psychological consultations were driven by events of intentional violence compared to a range of 13% or less at the beginning of the year.

Between January and July, MSF teams provided over 1,930 individual consultations for mental health and conducted 436 group therapy sessions through mobile activities and a fixed consultation room. In the same time period, our teams in Hebron also received nearly 170 alerts for incidents such as home demolitions, injuries, or attacks on the water and sanitation system. We ran 27 rapid responses, which can include mental health support, or the donation of essential items like mattresses or tarpaulin.

Growing barriers to medical care

In addition to escalating violence, movement restrictions and a collapsing healthcare system are also causing barriers to care.

“We have noticed a growing demand for our medical services because people are facing difficult economic conditions and cannot afford private healthcare,” says Dr Mohammad Haroub, assistant medical coordinator for MSF in Hebron.

A shortage of healthcare workers compounds the issue. Following its offensive in Gaza, Israel has withheld billions of dollars of tax revenue from the Palestinian Authority. This has severely impacted the payment of health workers, resulting in medical staff working reduced hours, and in some cases clinics are completely closed.

“The limited availability of health services, and shortages of healthcare workers and medicines within the Ministry of Health have created an additional burden,” says Dr Haroub. “Some patients tell us they have been without medication for several days.”

On top of this, reaching healthcare has also become increasingly difficult for many Palestinians. This is due to insecurity, checkpoints, and road closures.

“Life has become a heavy burden because of settler attacks,” says Aisha*, a woman from a village near Yatta who reached an MSF clinic in Khallet Al Mai. “I’m afraid all the time. My relatives hardly sleep. They’re afraid settlers might come.” Although only kilometres away, Aisha’s journey to the clinic was made longer by insecurity and detours.

Her mother-in-law suffers from diabetes and high blood pressure but, she says, “not all the medicines are available” where the family lives.

[1] OCHA: https://www.ochaopt.org/content/humanitarian-situation-report-23-july-2026

Operational constraints amid uncertainty

Despite the constraints, between January and July, MSF carried out 7,595 medical outpatient consultations in Hebron, including 1,910 for sexual and reproductive health. In June and July, having expanded from five to eight mobile clinics, MSF teams provided 1,450 and 1,397 outpatient consultations respectively. These were the highest monthly figures in 2026, a 26 per cent increase compared with the previous two months. The most common issues people required healthcare for were gynaecological conditions, non-communicable diseases, upper respiratory infections, and conjunctivitis.

This comes after we were forced to reduce more than half our mobile activities in the first quarter of the year amid deregistration by the Israeli authorities. This limited access to areas such as the militarised H2 neighbourhood in Hebron City and villages in Masafer Yatta hills, which are prone to violence and attacks. To reach patients from communities that could no longer be visited by MSF, we launched new clinics close to the edge of Area C, an area exclusively controlled by the Israeli forces, ensuring people there could still access our services.

Despite adapting activities, MSF teams continue to face significant operational constraints.

“Every day, we don’t know whether we will even reach the clinic. The context is constantly changing,” says Elisa Tamimi, MSF humanitarian affairs officer in Hebron. “Sometimes entire areas are placed under closure for a day, two days, or even a week. This has a huge impact on people’s lives. Many have lost their jobs and cannot find new work.”

“Israeli authorities must halt all measures that force Palestinians from their homes, ensure unhindered access to healthcare and humanitarian assistance, protect civilians, and comply with international law,” says Joan Tubau, MSF head of mission for Palestine.

Aisha says they are not asking for much: “I hope life can return to how it was before the war. I hope people can live with dignity. I want people to go out without fear, to have healthcare, education, and basic necessities.”

ENDS 

*Name changed to protect identity.

Beyond the devastation in southern Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs, the war’s consequences have also reached the Bekaa Valley, a vast agricultural region in eastern Lebanon bordering Syria. This adds yet another layer to the overlapping crises the region has endured, including economic collapse, underfunded healthcare facilities, inadequate water and sanitation infrastructure, and a protracted refugee situation. 

Since Israeli bombardment escalated on 2 March, people fleeing blanket evacuation orders have sought refuge across the Bekaa, where already vulnerable communities, including Syrian refugees, face mounting pressure. Displacement in the governorate peaked in April, with 52,935 people recorded as displaced in shelters and within host communities. Today, many of the families returning to their homes and neighborhoods within Bekaa are facing facilities damaged by Israeli bombardment and different barriers to accessing healthcare. 

Many have settled in the Bekaa, renting what they can afford, staying in collective shelters, or returning to family homes left years earlier. For them, displacement didn’t end when the bombardment became less intense; it became the slower work of rebuilding with no income and often no health coverage, in a governorate where public attention has largely moved on. 

Displaced, Without Stability 

In Kamed El Loz, in Lebanon’s West Bekaa, the landscape opens into farmland and wide valley views, but for families like Maha and Hassan, finding a place to live does not mean finding stability. In a rented room, Maha cares for her husband, Hassan, since March, when the war forced them out of Al Khiyam, southern Lebanon, where their house was destroyed. Hassan cannot move independently; Maha is his only caregiver. Staying at her sister’s second-floor apartment proved unworkable, so they moved to Kamed El Loz, with no income and no immediate prospect of returning home.  

“Since we left our home, everything has become more difficult. I must take care of my husband and manage everything on my own,” Maha said. 

 Maha had stopped taking the medication she needs as she could no longer afford it.  

Through outreach visits, MSF teams met Hassan and Maha, and helped them access the healthcare services they need.  

 Since 2 March, MSF teams in the Bekaa have provided 13,722 medical consultations, including 7,505 for acute conditions, 6,760 for non-communicable diseases, 2,570 sexual and reproductive health interventions, and 852 consultations for children under five, alongside 3,270 health promotion sessions. 

In Zahle, Bekaa governorate, another family faces a different upheaval, as they prepared to welcome a new member of the family. Before the war, the family was living in Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon, building a life around agriculture. Khalil and his pregnant wife, Mirna, returned to his hometown, Zahle, into an old family house inherited from his grandfather; shelter, but not stability. With Mirna close to giving birth, the family had no way to cover the cost. 

“Our work is gone, and our lives are torn,” Khalil said. 

The consequences of the war have affected families like Mirna and Khalil far beyond their homes, disrupting their income, housing, and ability to prepare for the birth of their child.  

“When you are preparing for your child to be born, you should think about the future. Instead, I was worried about how we would pay for the delivery and how we would rebuild our lives.” Khalil reflected.  

 Through its partnership with Libano-Français Hospital in Zahle, MSF helped ensure Mirna could access the hospital’s specialized maternity care and give birth safely.  

What Access to Healthcare Means  

“The Lebanese population is enduring difficult living conditions due to the protracted economic crisis exacerbated by the ongoing armed conflict and political instability. Internally displaced people, refugees, and less privileged communities are among those most affected, often facing overcrowded living conditions, limited access to healthcare, and growing difficulties affording food and shelter. Civilians must be protected, and safe, timely access to humanitarian assistance and healthcare must be ensured for everyone in need,” said Amro Ibrahim, MSF Bekaa project coordinator. 

MSF has maintained a long-term medical presence in the Bekaa, adapting its response as needs change. In Baalbek-Hermel, MSF operates an essential healthcare center in Hermel and a mobile clinic, while across the Bekaa, mobile teams continue to reach communities where access to healthcare is limited. 

Since the escalation of Israeli bombardment on 2 March, MSF has also supported people displaced into the Bekaa, including those living in collective shelters and public spaces.  Teams provided essential relief items, rehabilitated water and sanitation systems, supplied fuel and water, and delivered healthcare through mobile clinics. 

In the Bekaa, MSF has distributed 1,796 hygiene kits, 1,020 blankets, 962 mattresses, 109,691 liters of drinking water, 929,000 liters of water, 31,200 liters of fuel, and 32 cleaning kits since 2 March.  

“In a context where people face multiple barriers to healthcare, access is not simply about having a service available. Partnering with an existing operational hospital allowed us to respond rapidly to those needs and provide safe access,” said Loubna Marouf, MSF emergency coordinator in Bekaa. MSF’s team also supports access to emergency obstetrics care at secondary health facilities in the Bekaa, strengthening hospital capacity and supporting the provision of quality, timely care to communities. 

Bridging Gaps  

For those who were displaced, those returning home, and those who stayed, the crisis continues to shape daily life; through lost livelihoods, damaged homes, and pressure on essential services.  

 MSF’s response has therefore evolved alongside these changing needs: from emergency support during displacement to longer-term healthcare activities, mobile clinics, hospital support, essential healthcare and referrals for specialized treatment. 

The crisis may have moved out of the headlines, but for many in the Bekaa, its effects still shape everyday life. Maintaining access to healthcare means continuing to reach communities where they are, supporting health facilities under pressure, and ensuring that communities can receive the care they need. 

 The Needs That Remain  

Across the Bekaa, Lebanese communities, Syrian refugees, internally displaced people and returnees continue to face the consequences of overlapping crises. For many, immediate danger may no longer be the only concern. Rebuilding a home, recovering income, and accessing healthcare can become a longer struggle. 

 In Bekaa, the effects of crises continue to shape where people live, how they earn a living, and whether they can access the care they need. 

 “I don’t feel stable, and I don’t think I will ever feel that stability again because my home is gone. I only feel at ease in my own home, in my own village,” Maha says. 

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) strongly condemns the decision by the Israeli Military Advocate General (MAG) to close, without opening a criminal investigation, the cases MSF itself submitted for review: the multiple attacks on an MSF convoy in Gaza City in November 2023 that killed two, and the February 2024 strike on an MSF shelter in Khan Younis that killed two and injured six.

Unfortunately, this does not come as a surprise. These responses come nearly two years after MSF’s request was submitted, which was followed by a submission to the Israeli High Court of Justice challenging the MAG’s failure to provide any answer to our formal requests.

This is not justice. Two years of silence, followed by closures that raise more questions than they answer, is unacceptable. However, it is the predictable output of a military apparatus investigating itself: a system which has demonstrated itself unwilling to respond to the extent of violations that may amount to war crimes emerging from Gaza.

MSF staff and their family members are dead. Their names are known. Their locations were shared. Their vehicles were identified.  We have always maintained that all elements point to a clear responsibility of the Israeli army for the deadly attacks. And yet, those responsible for their deaths have declined to pursue any criminal investigation.

With this decision, the MAG has made clear that there is no prospect of accountability within the Israeli legal system for the killing of our staff, just as there has been no accountability for Israel’s ongoing genocide against Palestinians. 

A total of 15 MSF staff members have been killed in Gaza by Israeli forces since October 2023. This is just a fraction of the 1,700 healthcare workers who have been killed in that time. Israeli forces continue to kill civilians with impunity, something these decisions by the MAG, make clear.

The decision to ‘close’ these incidents must be understood in their proper context: in Gaza, tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed. Healthcare facilities have been destroyed. Humanitarian convoys have been struck. Journalists, medical personnel, UN personnel, and aid workers have been killed in numbers unprecedented in any recent conflict.

MSF reaffirms what it has stated since the beginning of this violence: there is no military objective that justifies the wholesale sacrifice of civilians. And there is no internal military review that can substitute for genuine, independent, and impartial accountability.

We demand that the cases involving our colleagues be reviewed by an impartial investigative body.

To our colleagues we have lost, and to the countless civilians and humanitarian workers who have perished in Gaza: we will not let your deaths be filed away as procedural inevitabilities. You deserved protection. You deserve justice.

Dr Javid Abdelmoneim
International President, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)

Amman/Jerusalem, 12 August – Thousands of people in Gaza, Palestine, are at heightened risk of death and severe illness, as Israeli authorities continue to restrict the entry of engine oil and spare parts into the enclave, warns Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). These supplies are needed to keep hospital generators, ambulances, water pumps and water trucks running. The impediment of these essential services is emblematic of Israel’s systematic destruction of the necessities for life in Gaza.

Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza, remains in solitary confinement, after being detained for 1.5 years. MSF is outraged by the treatment of healthcare workers, most of whom are being detained in dire conditions, without justification or cause. We join global calls for their immediate release. Dr Abu Safiya’s placement into solitary confinement and reported torture follows an appalling pattern of the Israeli authorities detaining and targeting medical staff across Palestine. 

His case is not isolated. According to the Healthcare workers watch, 95 Palestinian healthcare workers who remain detained by Israeli authorities since October 2023. During the same time, 1,700 health staff have been killed, as well as 15 MSF colleagues. 

MSF orthopaedic surgeon, Dr Mohammed Obeid, has been detained in Israel for more than 600 days, in difficult conditions, and without any contact with his family. He was arrested on 26 October 2024 by Israeli forces while on duty at the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, Palestine.  We continue calling for his immediate and unconditional release. 

The practice of arbitrarily detaining, torturing and abusing Palestinian medical staff in Israel is unacceptable. For too long, too many world leaders have failed to condemn Israel’s conduct in Palestine. Silence has become complicity. 

We call for the release of all arbitrarily detained medical personnel immediately. Pending their release, they must be granted access to adequate medical care and dignified detention conditions. 

In the occupied West Bank, decades of Israeli restrictions and deadly violence have shaped Palestinians’ daily lives and access to essential services. The situation has worsened since the all-out war in Gaza began in 2023. A total of 1,109 Palestinians – at least 243 of them children – have been killed by Israeli forces and settlers in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, to date. Seventy-four people have been killed this year alone.  

In Nablus, where Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) provides mental health care, women supported by the organisation describe the hardships of their daily lives, and particularly the obstacles to accessing care. A situation that has worsened since the Israeli authorities decided to deny registration to numerous international humanitarian organisations, including MSF. 

In 2011, Rana’s two-year-old daughter, who had disabilities, fell ill. The family lived in Azzoun Atma and had no car. No taxis were running. The village, an enclave in the Qalqilya governorate hemmed in by settlements and separation walls, has only one entrance: a gate that the Israeli army opens for only a few hours a day. That night, it was closed. 

“My daughter died because we could not leave,” says the 39-year-old mother. “We had to wait for morning, for the gate to open and for a taxi to take her to hospital. What I went through, many Palestinian mothers have been through. I do not want to believe there is a place anywhere in the world where people suffer more than here.”  

Rana has five living children, including a baby who is a few months old. Two of her daughters, twins, have severe disabilities. On her wedding day, in 2004, the family home was partly demolished by the Israeli army. More than 20 years on, she and her family are still rebuilding it, room by room, as their means allow. 

From her windows, she says, “the first thing you see is the wall. Then the settlements.” Two Israeli settlements border Azzoun Atma: Sha’arei Tikva and Oranit. Both are illegal under international law. The route of the separation wall between these settlements and Azzoun Atma has turned the village into a dead end. 

A few months ago, about to give birth, Rana had to bring herself to take the road at night. “I first went to Qalqilya,” she recounts. “They wrote me a referral letter saying I had to go to Nablus. But it was night-time. My husband and I thought about it for a long time, and in the end, we took the risk.” She was afraid, for herself and for her unborn child. This time, all went well. “The greatest achievement, these days, is getting home safe and sound,” she says. 

The teams of MSF, who have worked in the West Bank for decades, share this assessment, as Filipe Ribeiro, MSF head of mission, points out: “When Palestinians in the West Bank leave home in the morning, they do not know whether they will be able to get back that evening, because of the checkpoints. Anyone can be arrested and held in administrative detention by the Israeli army for months or years. Add to that the fear of an attack by settlers or of a military operation by the Israeli army.” 

As of December 2025, OCHA documented 925 movement obstacles that permanently or intermittently restrict the movement of 3.4 million Palestinians across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. Settler violence, in particular, has changed scale: at least 3,088 attacks were recorded over 2023 to 2025, compared with around 1,860 over 2021 to 2023, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights*. 

Rana’s case, having lost her daughter, is far from isolated. “We are facing a system of obstruction to care: checkpoints multiplying, ambulances delayed or blocked, medical transport targeted, hospitals encircled, treatments interrupted. The denial of care is not collateral damage, it is a way of operating,” Ribeiro says. 

With the Israeli authorities’ refusal to register 37 international humanitarian organisations, including MSF, in early 2026, things have become more difficult for the organisation.  

“In concrete terms, it means we are no longer allowed to call the Israeli military authorities that control the West Bank to coordinate the movements of our teams. This poses real security problems,” says Ribeiro. “We are never certain that the protection our teams are entitled to, as humanitarian workers, is respected when they leave Nablus.”  

Deploying international staff is now impossible for MSF. The Palestinian teams in the West Bank are nonetheless supported remotely from Amman, in Jordan. 

Unable to guarantee the safety of its teams outside the city, MSF has concentrated all its activities on the single clinic in Nablus, where patients are seen in person, and suspended all its mobile activities, notably in Qalqilya and Tubas. If Rana wants a mental health consultation, she has to make the journey from Azzoun Atma to Nablus, a particularly difficult undertaking.  

“Mental health work is done face to face. Not over the phone,” says Shorouq Al-Madmooj, a social worker who has worked with MSF for 22 years. “We want our patients to come to Nablus to receive care, because they need it. But at the same time, we do not want to put them in danger.” 

What Shouruq has observed among MSF’s patients, over the years, is an erosion. “The problems people used to face were much simpler,” she explains. “Today, the difficulties are far more complex. For children as much as for adults.”  

Psychological disorders are appearing at an ever-earlier age. In the youngest, they take the form of bed-wetting or hyperactivity, driven by “the anxiety of military incursions.”  

“Sadly, death has become an ordinary thing in our region. We do not know what tomorrow will bring,” says Al-Madmooj. 

Mariam is 25. She comes from Nur Shams camp, in Tulkarem, in the northern West Bank, and the road from there to Nablus, she says, is “difficult, full of detours, very long, exhausting.” She recently emerged from a long period of depression. “After the war began [the Israeli offensive on Gaza in 2023], I felt the urge to change something, to do something I was capable of.” 

She took one training course after another: first aid, first responder, advanced first aid, then an emergency medical services exam sat alongside nursing students, with a high score. She ended up accompanying the ambulances during incursions into the camp, to help the wounded. “Even with our vests, there was no protection for paramedics, journalists or anyone else,” she says. “People were being killed in their own homes, simply for looking out of a window.” 

On 21 January 2025, two days after a ceasefire took effect in Gaza, the Israeli army launched the military operation “Iron Wall” in the West Bank. The first incursion was on Jenin camp, then Tulkarem, and finally Nur Shams, on 9 February. Within weeks, almost all the inhabitants in the camps were displaced. Mariam was one of them. Sheltering for a time in Bal’a, a nearby village, she learned one day that soldiers had taken over the family home and declared it a military zone.  

“All at once, I realised I had nowhere to go,” says Mariam.  

A year after the operation began, the camps were still occupied, Israeli forces stationed inside and demolition orders continuing. According to satellite imagery analysed by the UN, about 35 per cent of Nur Shams had been destroyed as early as May 2025. When Mariam was able to return, she found her house badly damaged but still standing, unlike her sister’s, who now lives with her.  

“There is no camp anymore,” she says. “It has become a cemetery, because so many people lost their loved ones there. I feel as if the smell of blood is still there.” 

Mariam’s story is not only one of displacement and violence. It is a fragment of a policy that can be read at the scale of the whole territory. Since January 2025, more than 33,000 people have been displaced from the Jenin, Tulkarem and Nur Shams camps and their surroundings, according to UNRWA. And 2025 was a record year for settlement building: 86 new outposts, 54 officially approved settlements, nearly 28,000 housing units authorised, according to the Israeli NGO Peace Now. 

“It is a deliberate policy of confining the population and of territorial fragmentation,” says Ribeiro, MSF head of mission. “The aim is to make a two-state solution impossible, that is, to prevent any territorial, social, economic or cultural continuity of the West Bank and of Palestine in general.” 

This policy has daily consequences for Rana, who has to give up many medical appointments, but also more ordinary outings: “Before, we used to come to Nablus every week. Now, maybe once a year. We could run into settlers, and they could throw stones at us.” 

*https://searchlibrary.ohchr.org/record/35209/files/20260105-thematic-report-israel-discrimin.pdf?ut… 

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) today released “No Safe Place to Heal,” a report documenting relentless attacks on healthcare and medical personnel in Ukraine, which appear to constitute a deliberate strategy to destroy the medical system and collectively punish the population – rather than being an incidental product of Russia’s invasion. 

Between April 2022 and December 2025, MSF documented more than 20 attacks on medical facilities associated with its activities. Four hospitals where MSF worked have been completely destroyed. Seven ambulance bases had to be abandoned. MSF has lost access to over 80 villages it supported across six regions with primary healthcare mobile clinics. The World Health Organization documented 2,811 attacks on healthcare from February 2022 to the end of 2025, and Ukraine’s Ministry of Health reports that Russian forces have damaged or destroyed over 2,500 medical facilities in the same period, including 327 that have been completely destroyed. 

“These attacks are too consistent, too frequent, and too precise to be incidental; when hospitals are struck repeatedly, when ambulances are targeted with precision drones, when medical workers are killed en-route to delivering medicines in clearly marked vehicles – this is not coincidence. This is a pattern; patterns have intent behind them.” 

• Robin Meldrum, MSF Country Coordinator in Ukraine 

Strikes on medical infrastructure and the crippling fear of attacks on civilians have created a crisis in access to healthcare for people in need of non-emergency medical treatment or treatment for chronic conditions. An MSF survey of 187 civilians in near-frontline regions found that those who ‘always’ or ‘most of the time’ had access to healthcare diminished from 72% before the war’s escalation to just 35% since. Those accessing care ‘rarely’ or ‘never’ rose from 7% to 35%. This translates directly into suffering and even death from manageable conditions – cardiovascular disease, diabetes, epilepsy – conditions that have become life-threatening due to interrupted treatment and delayed access. Healthcare facilities that remain operational are cruelly understaffed: in one MSF-supported hospital in Kherson, the number of doctors has fallen by 66% since 2022. 

MSF teams in eastern and southern Ukraine work under the constant threat of First-Person View (FPV) drone attacks — weapons that allow soldiers to identify and strike targets with precision in real time. On 29 September 2025, a nurse and a director from an MSF-supported health centre delivering medicines in a clearly marked vehicle in Lyman, Donetsk, were struck by a Russian FPV drone. The director lost a leg in the attack. Under international humanitarian law, deliberately attacking clearly marked medical personnel or vehicles may amount to a war crime. 
 
MSF medical workers near the front line, and in an early rehabilitation treatment centre in Cherkasy, are witnessing how drone warfare is fast outstripping the medical response. Where injuries were once predominantly caused by artillery, drone strikes now account for a growing share of trauma cases – producing multiple victims with multiple simultaneous wounds, higher infection rates, and rising rates of sepsis.  
 
An MSF surgeon describes a patient who arrived with an amputated right leg, an open fracture of the left leg, an open fracture of the right arm, shrapnel in the left arm, and multiple wounds to the chest, abdomen and head. Five surgeons operated simultaneously for around six hours. The same surgeon noted: “The first battle is against bleeding. If the patient survives that, the second battle is against infection. And many lose that second fight.” 

This year marks ten years since the adoption of United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Resolution 2286, which unequivocally reiterates the protection of humanitarian and medical personnel, patients, and healthcare infrastructure in armed conflict. MSF calls on all parties to uphold their obligations under international humanitarian law; on states with influence over Russia to use it to demand an end to attacks on healthcare; and on the Security Council to properly investigate and make public denunciations about attacks on healthcare as a way of showing commitment to UNSC Resolution 2286. 

BUNIA, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), 15 July 2026 – Two months after the Ebola disease outbreak was officially declared in DRC, with more than 2,000 confirmed cases and 750 deaths, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is calling for an urgent scale-up of the medical response. The epidemic continues to spread at an unprecedented pace and into new areas, while efforts to control it remain insufficient. 

“Every delay costs lives. We are still chasing the outbreak instead of staying ahead of it. More people become infected, more families lose loved ones, and the epidemic becomes harder to contain. We need stronger, more coordinated international action to move faster and improve access to both Ebola care and other essential health services,” says Trish Newport, MSF Emergency Program Manager. 

In just two months, the current Ebola disease outbreak, caused by the Bundibugyo virus, has become the third largest Ebola outbreak and the fastest growing on record. In less than five weeks, the number of confirmed cases has tripled, from 650 to more than 2,000 as of 12 July, while the number of deaths has increased more than fivefold, from 130 to over 700. The epidemic has already exceeded half the number of cases recorded during DRC’s 2018–2020 Ebola outbreak, which lasted almost two years. 

The situation is particularly alarming, as the outbreak continues to expand geographically. Limited access to medical care, an overstretched surveillance system, and increasing pressure on treatment centres mean that entire communities outside of major urban areas remain without adequate support. 

MSF is therefore calling on health authorities and humanitarian actors to swiftly increase resources across all aspects of the Ebola response, including community engagement, surveillance, testing and diagnosis, patient care, survivor support, and the safe and dignified management of bodies and burials, while ensuring that other urgent health needs are also addressed. 

Ituri province, the epicentre of the outbreak, accounts for approximately 90 per cent of all confirmed cases.  

“In Mongbwalu, we are seeing the deadly human consequences of these gaps every day,” says Ayokunnu Raji, medical doctor and MSF Medical Program Manager. “At the Ebola Treatment Centre, we continue to see patients arriving in critical condition, little chance of survival. Since MSF started its Ebola response activities, we have treated 57 survivors, but more than 110 patients have died. Increased national and international resources would help prevent further transmission and loss of life.”  

“In Bunia, the 90-bed Elikiya Ebola Treatment Centre is almost always operating at full capacity. People regularly tell us they prefer to wait at home and come only when a bed becomes available,” says Sylvie Kaczmarczyk, MSF Emergency Coordinator in Bunia. “As a result, we continue to receive patients who arrive late and are already critically ill. It is devastating to know that many of these deaths could have been prevented through earlier diagnosis and timely access to care and treatment.” 

Bringing the response closer to communities 

While other medical organisations are working alongside the Ministry of Health in eastern DRC, significant gaps remain.  

DRC’s surveillance system is designed to detect cases early through strong community networks and the local health system. However, the current Ebola disease outbreak, combined with multiple other disease threats, has pushed the system to its limits.  

The key to slowing and ultimately stopping the spread of the epidemic is to bring the response closer to communities while boosting the medical response and surveillance system, so that cases can be identified and isolated as early as possible. Efforts to expand testing, contact tracing and community engagement must also continue. 

Movement restrictions, including border closures, self-monitoring requirements, and measures affecting humanitarian personnel applied by authorities in DRC and other countries, are creating additional challenges for the deployment and rotation of specialised Ebola staff.  

MSF currently runs seven ETCs and more than 15 isolation units across Ituri, North Kivu, South Kivu and Tshopo provinces, with a combined capacity of more than 430 beds. Since the beginning of the outbreak and up to 14 July, MSF teams had admitted more than 968 patients, including 357 confirmed cases. MSF has also supported the recovery of 116 survivors following treatment and care. In addition, MSF supports the Ministry of Health with surveillance and detection activities, community engagement, training, and efforts to ensure safe access to other essential healthcare services.  

Months after the escalation of war in Lebanon, hundreds of thousands of people have started returning to southern Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley and Beirut’s southern suburbs. People are returning to homes and villages in ruins, compounded by health facilities and essential services that are severely damaged. Despite repeated announcements of ceasefires, Israeli military operations including drone strikes, shelling and demolitions, continue in parts of southern Lebanon, leaving communities caught between returning home and ongoing insecurity. MSF is adapting its activities to ensure access to healthcare. 

“We are adapting our mobile activities in the hardest-hit areas in line with people’s movements, as communities return or relocate,” says Jeremy Ristord, MSF country coordinator. “Some families are returning to damaged homes, while others remain displaced, but humanitarian and medical needs remain immense. Recovery cannot happen while people continue to fear for their safety.” 

Returning to devastated villages 

Across southern Lebanon, people are contemplating a return to towns profoundly devastated by months of war. For those who do return, home is often no longer the place they left behind. 

Lina Jouni, an artist from Roumine, a village in the Nabatiyeh district, was displaced with her mother and sister during the bombardment. “We had to leave because of the bombardment, and my 79-year-old mother could not move or run. I had to get her somewhere safe,” she recalls. 

Back in her village and receiving care through an MSF mobile clinic, Lina feels torn. “Seeing my friends again restored a much-needed sense of normalcy, but I am devastated by the destruction around us,” she says. “I’m trying not to think about the past. When I first returned, I sat on my bed, then I went to my atelier to see my artworks. But I cannot create anymore.” 

While some, like Lina, have returned, many towns remain inaccessible. 

Abdallah Al Khaled, 72, from the village of Ain Arab in the Marjeyoun district, was displaced to a collective shelter.  His village, near the Wazzani River along Lebanon’s southeastern border, lies only a short distance away, yet remains inaccessible as Israeli forces continue to occupy the area. 

As he receives treatment at the MSF-supported Najdeh Al-Shaabiyeh Hospital in Nabatiyeh, the sound of explosions from demolitions carried out by Israeli forces echo in the distance.  

“We have land and olive groves that we cared for and cultivated. We lived off the land, and now, at the end of my days, I have to pack my personal belongings and live in a tent,” he says.  

Like many villages along the border, Ain Arab has been deeply affected by the war. Ongoing Israeli attacks, military presence, and repeated displacement orders have prevented residents from returning, leaving families displaced and uncertain about when, or whether, they will be able to go home. Today, he knows nothing of what remains of his home. 

Earlier in the war, Abdallah’s 18-year-old nephew was killed in an Israeli airstrike. “The misery is making me sick,” he adds. 

As of 2 July, nearly 500,000 people remain displaced across Lebanon, according to the International Organization for Migration. Many are unable to return safely because of continued Israeli military operations, while others have little shelter to return to. Across southern Lebanon and parts of the Bekaa Valley, widespread destruction of homes, healthcare facilities, roads and essential infrastructure continue to limit people’s ability to rebuild their lives.