Skip to main content

When “Aid” Becomes a Weapon: Jake Wood’s Resignation and the Crisis in Gaza

 

Brief Introduction: Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF)

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) is a newly formed aid organization established in late 2024, designed to operate a controversial new system for delivering humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip. The initiative was backed by Israeli officials and developed in coordination with American private contractors, including former intelligence and military personnel.

GHF was intended to replace traditional international aid networks with a privately managed system that would deliver food and supplies through secure distribution sites in southern Gaza—areas under Israeli military control. The foundation claimed it could deliver aid more efficiently and prevent diversion by Hamas. However, its lack of independence, deep ties to Israeli planners, and use of private security firms drew widespread criticism from humanitarian agencies and UN officials, who warned it could facilitate forced displacement and compromise the neutrality of aid.

Jake Wood, a respected U.S. veteran and aid worker, was appointed executive director but resigned before operations began, citing the impossibility of upholding humanitarian principles under the current framework.

In the shadow of ongoing horror in Gaza—where famine stalks the streets, hospitals lie in ruins, and over a million Palestinians remain displaced—another headline broke this week that demands the world’s attention. Jake Wood, the head of the newly-formed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, abruptly resigned just hours before the Israeli-backed aid initiative was set to launch. His reason? The system, he said, simply cannot operate with “humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence”—the core principles of humanitarian work.

This was no minor resignation. Wood is not a bureaucrat playing politics—he’s a former U.S. Marine and the founder of Team Rubicon, an organization that has provided frontline  aid in some of the world’s most devastated regions. If someone like Wood says a it’s time to pay serious attention.

A System Built on Control, Not Compassion

From the start, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation was riddled with suspicion. Reports show it was not conceived by neutral humanitarian actors but by Israeli officials, military officers, and American private contractors—including a former CIA officer. That alone should raise alarms. Aid, under this model, is not just food and medicine—it is a tool for political engineering.

Under this plan,  would have to traverse dangerous territory, often through active Israeli military zones, just to receive food. The United Nations and numerous NGOs have called this plan dangerous and deeply flawed, warning that it risks accelerating the forced displacement of Palestinians from north to south Gaza—a strategy critics argue is part of a broader Israeli aim to depopulate northern Gaza.

And yet, despite these concerns, the foundation presses on. “Our trucks are loaded and ready to go,” they proudly declared after Wood’s exit—seemingly unfazed by the moral integrity lost with his departure.

Aid Without Dignity Is Not Aid

Let’s be clear: Palestinians in Gaza are not just hungry—they are being starved. Israel’s months-long blockade on food and fuel has pushed the enclave to the brink of famine. Children are dying of malnutrition. Medical staff are performing surgeries without anesthesia. In such a context, "aid" that comes with strings, checkpoints, and agendas is no aid at all—it is exploitation wrapped in the language of relief.

Jake Wood’s resignation shines a light on a system that is no longer even pretending to be neutral. His statement is damning: “It is not possible to implement this plan while also strictly adhering to the humanitarian principles... which I will not abandon.”

The Bigger Picture: A Humanitarian Crisis Hijacked

This isn’t just about one man or one project. It’s about a larger pattern in which humanitarian principles are being eroded under the guise of “innovation” and “efficiency.” When military officers, intelligence agents, and foreign contractors design aid programs, they do not do so with the dignity of the victims in mind. They do it to maintain control.

And control is exactly what Israel seeks in Gaza—not just militarily, but over the very survival of Palestinians. Who eats, who suffers, who lives to see another day—all of it is now being micromanaged under a system that makes neutrality a casualty of war.

Where Is the Outrage?

Jake Wood's resignation should have sent shockwaves through the global humanitarian community—and yet, where is the coordinated global response? Where are the leaders demanding that aid return to being impartial, not politicized?

Wood closed his statement with a call to Israel to dramatically increase aid access through “all mechanisms,” without “delay, diversion, or discrimination.” That plea must now become a demand—not just from humanitarian leaders, but from every person of conscience who refuses to accept that starving people can be used as pawns.

Final Thoughts

This moment is not just a test for aid organizations. It’s a test for us all. Will we allow the suffering in Gaza to be managed by those who helped create it? Or will we insist that humanitarianism means something—that it requires courage, independence, and above all, humanity?

Jake Wood chose principle over power. The world should follow his lead.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Delivering the Dead: How the World Watches Gaza Bleed.

  Delivering the Dead: How the World Watches Gaza Bleed “ I delivered a beheaded woman who was nine months pregnant. ” That’s not a horror-film script. That’s not medieval history. That is the testimony of an Australian medic standing in a Gaza hospital in 2025, describing what it means to “ practice medicine ” under Israeli bombardment. A nine-months-pregnant woman , decapitated , her body torn open so that the child she carried could be pulled out lifeless — and somehow this is still not enough to shake the comfortable democracies of the West into anything resembling a conscience. We should probably give the Nobel Prize for Creative Euphemism to the politicians who still call this “self-defense.” After all, there’s nothing quite as defensive as severing the head of an expectant mother and forcing foreign doctors to deliver her dead child in the rubble of what used to be a hospital . Bravo, civilization . The tragedy is not just the atrocity itself. It’s the smug perfo...
Post a Comment
Read more

Docu Drama. The voice of Hind Rajab.

The Red Phone Rings, but the World Hits Mute The world just gave a 23-minute standing ovation —yes, twenty-three full minutes of clapping —for The Voice of Hind Rajab at the Venice Film Festival . Applause so long it could’ve filled Hind’s final desperate phone call to the Red Crescent. Bravo, humanity. We couldn’t save her when it mattered, but at least we can applaud her ghost. This is the new morality play: a five-year-old Palestinian child, trapped in a bullet-riddled car , whispering “please come, I’m scared ,” while surrounded by the corpses of her family. The Red Crescent tried . Paramedics drove toward her and were killed too . Israel buried them in silence . And the “ civilized world ”? It buried her in its news cycle . But now—don’t worry— we have a movie . Starring Hind’s voice. Directed by Kaouther Ben Hania. Produced by an ensemble of Hollywood conscience-bearers : Brad Pitt, Joaquin Phoenix, Rooney Mara, Alfonso Cuarón, Jonathan Glazer, Jemima Khan , and others. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

The End of Zionism? Welcome to the Funeral Nobody Wants to Admit Is Overdue

  Of course. Haaretz recently published an opinion piece by Ithamar Handelman -Smith titled “ Some Say It’s the End of Zionism, and I Say That’s All Right .” And what impeccable timing: as Israel carries out a near-two-year campaign of siege, famine, and bombardment in Gaza — slaughtering families, burying aid workers with their ambulances, and literally starving children to death — someone in Israel finally whispers the unspeakable: maybe Zionism, that 20th-century project of “ Jewish salvation ,” has outlived its moral shelf life. Bravo. The house is burning, bodies are scattered in the street, and the philosopher shows up with a garden hose . Zionism: Success Story or Crime Scene? Handelman-Smith argues that Zionism achieved its success : a Jewish state, a safe haven, a fortress against the ghosts of Europe’s crimes . But like every “ success story ” drenched in other people’s blood , it didn’t age well. What began as refuge turned into domination; what was called “ ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Dockers of Conscience: Italy’s Brave Guardians of Gaza

  At a time when most governments avert their eyes , when institutions choose silence over principle, it is often the hands hardened by real work — the hands of dockworkers— that lift the banner of humanity. In Genoa , those hands belong to the members of the Unione Sindacale di Base (USB) and the dockworkers’ collective CALP ( Collettivo Autonomo Lavoratori Portuali ) . These are not new voices. For years they have stood where conscience demands —on the cold concrete of the docks , blocking ships laden with weapons destined for wars , refusing to let Italy’s ports be complicit in bloodshed. USB , born in 2010 out of grassroots struggles , has carried a proud history of international solidarity. Its members have consistently placed labor at the service of justice, from strikes against austerity to protests against militarism . CALP , forged in Genoa’s port , has a more direct history with Palestine: blocking Israeli-bound weapons , organizing boycotts, and declaring, time ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Britain’s Recognition of Palestine: A Century of Complicity in Disguise.

So we’ve reached this moment: Keir Starmer’s UK “ recognises the State of Palestine. ” Applause lines up. Speeches made. Headlines dazzled. But behind the pomp, the guns, the exports, the intelligence, the training — history rings out in mocking laughter. Because Britain has been complicit since day one. This recognition is not redemption . It’s theatre. 1. The Original Sin: Balfour Declaration Let’s go back. Because if you don’t know your history, you’ll be fooled by the future. On 2 November 1917 , Arthur James Balfour (Britain’s Foreign Secretary) wrote to Lord Rothschild, and officially declared: “His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object , it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine , or the rights and political sta...
Post a Comment
Read more