Flash Appeal 2026 at a Glance

The United Nations and its partners estimate US$4.06 billion is required to deliver time sensitive, life-saving support to 3.6 million people in need of humanitarian assistance across OPT in 2026.

The magnitude and severity of death, destruction and extreme deprivation in the Gaza Strip have generated profound human suffering and humanitarian needs. In the West Bank, demolitions, operations by Israeli forces, settler violence and movement restrictions continue to trigger displacement and drive a range of humanitarian needs. The erosion of community resilience mechanisms has further intensified needs across all sectors.

The priority in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) is to scale up the humanitarian response, capitalizing on any improvement in access conditions to prevent further loss of life, morbidity, and trauma. The response aims to deliver life-saving assistance and ensure appropriate protection mitigation and response across Gaza and the West Bank. This will be done by leveraging the comparative advantage, systems and structures of the United Nations-coordinated system, NGO partners, community networks, logistics and distribution systems, and experience to:

• Provide emergency supplies including food, water, NFIs, education materials, and others until services and markets are again operable.
• Make assistance accessible to all people in need, including delivering in the hard-to-reach areas.
• Support existing structures, services, and markets where feasible.
• Integrate time-critical interventions in Gaza which lay the foundations for sustainable recovery.

Delivery of the response depends on a conducive operating environment. While there have been improvements in the volume of supplies brought into Gaza and the ability of aid actors to expand the delivery of critical services since the ceasefire took effect on 10 October, humanitarian actors continue to face a range of bureaucratic impediments, access restrictions, and anti-UN rhetoric, which collectively constrain humanitarian space and the ability to operate at scale. Genuine efforts to enable humanitarian assistance to and throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) will require full compliance by parties with international humanitarian law, including the protection of civilians, and critical changes in the operating environment.

The United Nations-coordinated system includes a total of 201 UN agencies, international and national NGOs, and the International Red Cross/Red Crescent Movement.

The UN and partners will provide a comprehensive package of multisectoral assistance in a dignified and principled manner that targets and ensures access to aid for the most vulnerable individuals and households. Select priority interventions include (non-exhaustive list):

• Provide lifesaving essential health services delivered across 400 health service delivery platforms focused on preventative, curative, rehabilitative interventions and referrals, and enhance health system operational capacity by ensuring availability of health workers and medical commodities.
• Expand access to essential nutrition services, to detect, refer and treat acute malnutrition, and prevent malnutrition in children and breastfeeding women.
• Provide multi-purpose cash assistance, leveraging improvements in market conditions and banking, affording agency and dignity to those we are assisting, in accordance with expressed preferences.
• Enhance Emergency Protection Responders Network as the frontline protection response team and community-based protection interventions while providing services to high-risk groups.
• Provide mental health and psychosocial support services across Gaza for both children and adults, and comprehensive gender-based violence response and mitigation services.
• Conduct explosive ordnance disposal and risk education sessions.
• Establish temporary learning spaces near and within displacement sites for safe and inclusive learning environments.
• Repair, rehabilitate, and expand water and sanitation systems and strengthen community engagement for efficient and inclusive use and maintenance of water, sanitation, and hygiene services and intensify emergency solid waste management to address the urgent needs of approximately 900,000 people living near garbage.
• Provide emergency shelter assistance and interim shelter solutions alongside non-food items including but not limited to household items, winter clothing, hygiene supplies, and dignity kits.
• Provide large-scale delivery of in-kind food and community-based feeding (kitchens, bakeries, community ovens) ensuring access to diverse and fortified foods and support farmers, herders, and fishers to rehabilitate the agrifood system.

The UN and its partners employ a multi-layered approach to risk management comprised of global standards coupled with contextually relevant measures to minimize the risk of aid diversion. Humanitarian assistance coordinated through the UN system is provided in accordance with the following fundamental standards:

• We know who is being assisted and who did or did not receive assistance.
• We control and monitor assistance from origin to the hands of intended beneficiaries.