Report: Doctors Without Borders Abandoned Neutrality, Employed Staff with Hamas Ties
A new NGO Monitor report documents MSF's employment of staff with terror links and systematic silence on Hamas' militarization of hospitals
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), the Nobel Prize-winning medical charity known as Doctors Without Borders, systematically abandoned its core principles of neutrality and impartiality to lead an international “genocide” campaign against Israel while remaining silent about Hamas’s weaponization of hospitals and employing staff with documented ties to terrorist organizations, according to an April 2026 report by NGO Monitor.
The 33-page investigation reveals how MSF, which operates with a $2.4 billion annual budget, transformed from a humanitarian relief organization into what the report’s authors call “a leading source of false accusations and demonization targeting Israel,” amplifying unverified Hamas propaganda that was subsequently cited in proceedings before the International Court of Justice.
The “Genocide” Double Standard
The report documents that MSF used the term “genocide” 272 times across all platforms to describe Israel’s military operations in Gaza from October 2023 to March 2026. During the same period, MSF made zero mentions of “genocide” regarding the conflicts in Sudan, where over 300,000 people have been killed and millions displaced in what experts widely consider ethnic cleansing, or in Syria, Yemen, Ukraine, or Myanmar. MSF Canada placed full-page newspaper advertisements in the Toronto Star and Globe and Mail explicitly labeling Israel’s actions as genocide, while MSF International President Dr. Javid Abdelmoneim testified at the “Gaza Tribunal” accusing Israel of deliberately destroying Gaza’s healthcare system—without mentioning Hamas once.
“MSF is no longer neutral; its humanitarian language now serves a political cause,” warned Alain Destexhe, MSF’s former Secretary General (1991-1995), in a March 2025 analysis co-authored with Dr. Karine Toledano. The report reveals what experts describe as “blatant hypocrisy and Holocaust inversion,” applying double standards that the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance identifies as a central form of antisemitism.
Systematic Silence on Hamas Hospital Militarization
The NGO Monitor investigation reveals that MSF personnel working in Gaza hospitals maintained systematic silence about Hamas’s documented use of medical facilities for military purposes, despite clear awareness of “closed and off-limits sections” in facilities where they operated. The Israel Defense Forces documented finding weapons caches, tunnel shafts, and command centers in Al-Shifa Hospital, Al-Rantisi Hospital, and Indonesian Hospital- all facilities where MSF maintained an active presence.
In February 2026, MSF itself was forced to suspend operations at Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis after staff “reported a pattern of unacceptable acts” including “the presence of armed men, some of them masked; intimidation; arbitrary arrests of patients; and a recent situation involving the suspected movement of weapons.” This admission came only after extensive IDF documentation had “rendered continued denial untenable,” according to the Destexhe-Toledano analysis. Throughout the war, MSF had denied Israeli claims that terrorists were using hospitals as operational bases.
The report also documents MSF’s erasure of Hamas’s 500-kilometer “Metro” tunnel network beneath civilian centers, the estimated 100,000 improvised explosive devices planted throughout Gaza, and Hamas’s documented hijacking of humanitarian aid convoys and sale of supplies at inflated prices. MSF attributed food scarcity exclusively to Israeli restrictions while omitting Hamas’s systematic aid theft.
Terror Links Among MSF Staff
The investigation identifies specific MSF employees with documented terror affiliations. Fadi Al-Wadiya, an MSF physiotherapist for six years, was identified by the IDF as “a significant operative in [Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s] missile array.” Mahmoud Abu Nujaila, an MSF employee, headed the Democratic Health Association for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Nasser Hamdi Al-Shalfouh, an MSF driver, was identified as a Hamas sniper.
The report reveals that declassified Hamas documents from 2018-2022 show a systematic “kafeel” (guarantor) system in which Hamas vetted and monitored senior local MSF staff to gain internal information about the organization’s operations. An MSF recruiter stated they were “explicitly told not to check backgrounds or conduct security vetting on Arab staff in Gaza.”
A December 2023 review by Destexhe documented that over 40 percent of public statements by MSF staff, including senior figures, praised Hamas and the October 7 massacre. Some boasted of participation in tunnel construction and weapons production. A former MSF deputy coordinator in Gaza publicly celebrated Hamas and circulated images of abducted Israeli hostages.
October 7 Response and Al-Ahli Hospital Disinformation
On October 7, 2023, the day Hamas terrorists massacred over 1,200 Israelis, raped and mutilated victims, and kidnapped 250 hostages, MSF’s first social media post was an unverified accusation directed at Israel for causing the death of a nurse and ambulance driver, “without condemning Hamas or even acknowledging the heinous slaughter, rapes, mutilation, torture, burning of families alive, or kidnapped hostages.”
Following the October 17, 2023 explosion at Al-Ahli Hospital, MSF became “a primary source of disinformation and demonization,” immediately blaming Israel for the blast. Western intelligence agencies and investigations by The New York Times later concluded the explosion was likely caused by a misfired Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket. MSF never issued a retraction or correction.
Throughout the conflict, the report documents, MSF relied exclusively on casualty figures from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Ministry of Health without verification, despite widespread documentation that these figures are “completely unreliable” and fail to distinguish between combatants and civilians.
Critical Omissions
MSF failed to publish dedicated medical reports on the 1,200 victims of the October 7 attack or the medical condition of the 250 hostages held in Gaza. The organization omitted that approximately 10-12 percent of rockets fired from Gaza fall short inside Gaza, causing Palestinian casualties often attributed to Israel. MSF reports consistently erased Hamas’s documented use of civilians as human shields and the military necessity of Israeli operations against a terror organization embedded in civilian infrastructure.
The NGO Monitor report concludes with five recommendations: comprehensive independent investigations into how MSF became a participant in “demonization campaigns”; immediate cessation of genocide accusations and similar “unsupported allegations”; external vetting of all personnel to prevent inclusion of individuals with terror links; removal of bias sources and implementation of accountability mechanisms; and government review of MSF branches’ charitable status in their respective countries.
“An organization genuinely concerned with Palestinian civilian lives would denounce Hamas’s use of civilians as human shields, its conversion of hospitals into military installations, and its theft and diversion of humanitarian aid,” Destexhe and Toledano wrote. “That silence leaves the international community to ask whether MSF is advocating for Palestinians or functioning as a humanitarian façade through which terror is laundered by the moral authority of humanitarian medicine.”