Skyline International for Human Rights (SIHR) has released a new human rights brief exposing the dangers of militarizing humanitarian aid in Gaza, turning it into a tool for surveillance and control. SIHR calls for the dismantling of the so-called “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation” (GHF) and an end to the use of aid as a weapon to coerce residents into surrendering their biometric data in exchange for food.
The brief also documents how the US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has replaced the neutral UN-led aid system with a privatized and militarized model of food distribution. As a result, Palestinians are faced with an impossible choice: submit to the registration of their most private biometric data or face the risk of hunger and deadly violence in chaotic queues.
The report indicates that these practices have led to what resemble “death traps” that have resulted in the deaths of more than 20,000 Palestinians, including more than 14,000 children.
The brief revealed findings, most notably that aid is exchanged for biometric data, with Palestinians forced to provide facial scans and personal photos in exchange for food, as part of a program misleadingly marketed as “voluntary.”
The brief noted the involvement of private military companies: American companies such as Safer Ritter Solutions (SRS) carried out violent operations at aid distribution sites in Gaza using advanced military equipment and weapons.
He also reviewed joint monitoring, where facial recognition cameras at aid distribution points transmit images directly to joint US-Israeli control rooms.
The brief noted the design and planning of private companies: Consulting firms such as the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and other technology companies contributed to the design of this digital system, including checkpoints that exclude residents who refuse to provide their data.
Skyline International for Human Rights said that the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and its contractors “have turned the bread line into a checkpoint, and the bag of flour into bait to extract biometric data. In Gaza, a child’s hunger has become a tool to extract sensitive data, and a meal carries a devastating price: their privacy, their independence, their future, and their very dignity.”
She added, “If this pattern continues, it risks becoming a global blueprint for using starvation as a tool of digital control in other conflict zones. The international community must act quickly to prevent this from becoming the ‘new normal.'”
It called for the dismantling of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and its biometrics program, and for all funding to be redirected to neutral UN-led mechanisms. It also called for independent investigations into all parties, including private companies and their supporting states, regarding their potential involvement in war crimes and violations of the Genocide Convention.
It called for a ban on the forced collection of biometric data in humanitarian contexts, recognizing it as a violation of the right to privacy and a form of inhuman treatment, and suspending all activities of private military and security companies in Gaza that contribute to the militarization of aid or the imposition of biometric surveillance
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