Occupied Palestinian Territory

Oxfam has been working in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt) since the 1950s, establishing a country office in the 1980s. Together with partner organizations, we work with the most vulnerable communities in Gaza and the West Bank. Our joint efforts focus on improving livelihoods and advancing the rights of communities living under illegal occupation, prolonged suffering, deprivation, and hardship.

Oxfam has been delivering life‑saving humanitarian aid and programmatic support to communities across the oPt for decades. We work to facilitate humanitarian access and the delivery of assistance in line with international humanitarian law. Oxfam, together with partner organizations, responds to the humanitarian crisis with programming in areas including vital water infrastructure and other repair and maintenance work; hygiene kit distribution; livelihoods and agricultural support; food security interventions, and water sanitation and hygiene (WASH) activities. Our work also focuses on responding to needs around the protection of civilians, psycho-social support, and the rights of women.

Oxfam supports efforts to facilitate a peace process that will lead to a viable, permanent status agreement ensuring equality, security, dignity, sovereignty, justice and prosperity, both for Palestinians and Israelis.

Working for economic justice & equal rights

Oxfam and our partners are helping small businesses and farmers find the resources they need to succeed and have a voice in decisions that affect them. We are focused on helping women take up non-traditional roles[JH1] on their farms, in businesses, and in community leadership. We help women dairy, fruit, and vegetable producers succeed with training and access to information and technology.

Advancing gender justice for women and girls

Oxfam and our partners are helping to ensure that Palestinian women play a role in decision making and discussions about peace and security, including by working with the Palestinian Authority to take steps to eliminate sexual and gender-based violence. The program provides women and girls with services for survivors of sexual and gender-based violence.

Advocating for peace and security

Oxfam is challenging the Israeli occupation and connected discriminatory policies and practices at the heart of inequality, poverty, and injustice in the occupied Palestinian Territory. At the same time, we are working with local and national authorities to promote Palestinian livelihoods and the rights of Palestinians to pursue their own development, end the occupation, fully realize their rights and build the potential for a viable Palestinian state.

Oxfam campaigns for peace and an immediate end to the illegal blockade on Gaza imposed by Israel. Oxfam also opposes trade with settlements, which are illegally built in the West Bank, and calls for an end to the de facto annexation of the West Bank and forced displacement of Palestinians living in the West Bank.

Oxfam's position on the conflict

We believe that real progress toward justice and the elimination of poverty in the occupied Palestinian Territory can only be achieved through an end to the occupation and a just and peaceful solution to the conflict. Peace should be rooted in the recognition of the human rights and dignity of all Israelis and Palestinians, with a firm foundation in international law.

Why Oxfam is against settlements

Israeli settlements in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) are widely recognized by international governments as a violation of international law and a major obstacle to peace. In our daily work we see the negative impact of Israeli settlements on the lives and livelihoods of Palestinian businesses, farmers and herders. These settlements and the infrastructure and policies behind them are a major cause of Palestinian poverty and the denial of rights which we try to address in our work.

Settlements continue to expand across the West Bank–in the past 20 years, the settler population has doubled to more than 660,000. This has resulted in the confiscation of Palestinian land and resources and has fueled poverty.

The population transfer of Israeli settlers into the oPt; legalization of settlement outposts; demolition of property; confiscations of assets, land and resources; and impunity for settler violence are all rooted in the Israeli policy of forcibly displacing Palestinians from their lands and acquiring territory. This policy of land-grabbing is backed by a discriminatory legal system that favors Israeli settlers over Palestinian citizens, and parallel systems of rights and privileges.

This has left many Palestinians in Area C with one of two choices: either move elsewhere in the West Bank, with or without their families, or take up employment on settler farms, frequently under exploitative labor conditions. Some 35 percent of the land in East Jerusalem has been confiscated for Israeli settlement use; only 13 percent of East Jerusalem is zoned for Palestinian construction, much of which is already built up.

Settlement, employment, and poverty in in the West Bank

The Israeli military occupation, intensifying coercive environment (including settlement expansions), suffocating economic restrictions imposed by the Israeli government, and lack of accountability are primary drivers of poverty in the West Bank. According to the World Bank, restrictions on Palestinian access to Area C—the 61 percent of the West Bank that is under full Israeli civil and military control and where most settlements are located—cost the Palestinian economy about $3.4 billion in losses annually.

Unemployment in the West Bank has increased as a result: The unemployment rate among Palestinian youth stands at 40 percent (63 percent in Gaza before 2023). Some Palestinians do find work in Israeli settlement farms and factories (which receive support from the Israeli government). This is often because they are restricted from pursuing other livelihoods and have little other choice.

Oxfam works with Palestinian farmers and animal herders living near settlements across the West Bank. They can only cultivate one percent of the land located in Area C and can only access 20 percent of the water supply, while the rest falls under Israeli control. Palestinians in Area C require Israeli permits to build new homes, wells, irrigation systems or animal shelters, but 98 percent of Palestinian building permit applications are rejected. At the same time, Israeli settlements continue to expand.

Oxfam does not support a boycott of Israel

We oppose trade with Israeli settlements in the West Bank because they are illegally built on occupied land, and increase poverty among Palestinians.

However, we are not opposed to trade with Israel and we do not support a boycott of Israel, or any other country.

We do not fund activities that call for a boycott, divestment, or sanctions. Oxfam believes that a vibrant civil society is the best way to overcome global poverty and injustice, and we know that a strong civil society will have many different opinions and approaches. We work with more than 28 diverse local partners and we do not expect that all of them agree with us on all policy issues. Some of them may support a boycott, but we do not fund this part of their work.

Oxfam also does not fund or support any organizations that promote anti-Semitic or any other discriminatory practices, or advocate violence. We believe that trade with settlements, or companies located in settlements, contributes to legitimizing their presence and denying the rights of Palestinians. We promote ethical consumption, and we support the right of consumers to know the origin of the products they purchase. Therefore, we urge the Israeli government to ensure proper labeling of Israeli products and of settlement products so that consumers can differentiate between them.