WFP cuts Gaza food aid by a third as funding runs short

One of the main suppliers of food aid to Gaza, the World Food Programme (WFP), says it is being forced to “drastically reduce lifesaving assistance” to the Palestinian territory because of funding shortages. The cuts will hit as winter approaches, with most of the population still displaced and dependent on aid, the BBC reported.

Overall, the number of people helped by the UN agency will fall by about a third, from 1.6 million to 1.1 million.

What is being cut

• Hot meals provided by community kitchens will fall from 250,000 to 150,000 a day.
• Families in hard-to-reach areas, such as those near the so-called Yellow Line that marks Israel’s area of military control, will get a meal every other day instead of daily.
• The number of Gazans receiving bags of flour and ration boxes each month will fall from 1.1 million to 600,000.
• Cash transfers to about half a million people have already been reduced since July, leaving them less money to buy food in local markets.

The WFP received less than half as much funding for its Palestinian operations in 2026 as in previous years. It says it urgently needs $450 million to keep “critical” operations going over the next six months.

“It’s a disaster”

Mervat al-Satari, a displaced mother of five living in a camp in the al-Mawasi area of Khan Younis, said the news was a disaster. “What will we do with these reduced rations? How will we provide for the little ones?” she asked. “Sometimes we wait for these meals to eat.”

Sawsan Bahloul, also from al-Mawasi and a mother of three, said the daily aid had been “somehow ticking the box but now it will be every two days”. She said the community kitchen portions, usually pasta or lentils with occasional potatoes and aubergines, were already too small for her family.

Dalal al-Dahdouh, who lives with her family of eight in the ruins of her home in Gaza City, said the flour and the food boxes were not enough even before the cuts. “In the past, thank God, we had our own home and a wonderful life,” she said. “We had fresh vegetables, proper sanitation facilities and our own land. Now we live entirely on aid, including WFP vouchers.”

Needs have not fallen

Shaun Hughes, the WFP’s Palestine director, said the cuts were because of money, “not because the needs are coming down, or because we don’t have access, we do”. He described “brutal conditions”, with most people still without a proper home, living in tents, with poor access to water, sanitation and healthcare. “Cuts to food assistance are going to compound that hardship that families have been facing for three years now,” he said.

A ceasefire between Hamas and Israel was agreed a year ago, but humanitarian conditions remain dire. According to the BBC:

• Nearly all of Gaza’s 2.1 million people are displaced, and two-thirds rely on food aid to survive.
• There has been no reconstruction and little recovery, with Israel tightly controlling the entry of goods through the crossings.
• Food markets are now well stocked, but few can afford to buy from them, and more than 80 per cent of people are unemployed.
• There is no cooking gas in Gaza because the Israeli government considers it a “dual use” item that could be used by Hamas for military purposes. Many families send their children to find plastic and cardboard to burn for fuel.

In July, the Integrated Phase Classification (IPC), described by the BBC as the world’s foremost experts on food security, reported that two-thirds of the population, or 1.4 million people, were expected to face crisis or worse levels of acute food insecurity from July to December 2026. Aid workers say acute food insecurity and the risk of famine returning still loom over the territory.

What the WFP will keep doing

The agency says it can continue to support bakeries that supply one-third of Gaza’s bread needs, give nutritional help to about 300,000 women and children, and provide healthy snacks to about 200,000 children.

In the occupied West Bank, the WFP is still helping some 200,000 Palestinians, after halving the number of recipients in September. It says food insecurity is rising there mostly because of increased Israeli settler violence and Palestinian displacement.

Why it matters

A year after the ceasefire, Gaza’s families are being asked to live on less aid just as the cold sets in, in tents and ruined homes. The shortfall is a funding failure rather than a supply failure, according to the WFP, which makes it a test for the donors who have promised to support the territory’s recovery. Read our reports on how Gaza’s promised recovery has not begun and on Palestinian farmers’ fear of settler violence in the occupied West Bank.

This article draws on reporting by the BBC.