requirements under new registration rules. ActionAid, International Rescue Committee, Médecins Sans Frontières and Norwegian Refugee Council are among the aid agencies which will have their licences suspended on 1 January, with their operations to end within 60 days. Israel said they had, among other things, failed to hand over "complete" personal details of their staff. The INGOs said that could put them at risk. The move was condemned by 10 countries, which said the rules would have a severe impact on access to essential services.

In a joint statement, the foreign ministers of the UK, France, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Japan, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland said INGOs were integral to the humanitarian response in Gaza and that any attempt to stem their ability to operate was "unacceptable". "Without them, it will be impossible to meet all urgent needs at the scale required," they warned. The European Union's humanitarian chief, Hadja Lahbib, said: "Israel's plans to block INGOs in Gaza means blocking life-saving aid."

International humanitarian law "leaves no room for doubt: aid must reach those in need," she added. UN human rights chief Volker Türk called the INGO suspensions "outrageous" and "arbitrary", and said they made "an already intolerable situation even worse for the people of Gaza". The Humanitarian Country Team of the Occupied Palestinian Territory - a forum that brings together UN agencies and more than 200 local and international NGOs - urged the Israeli authorities to reconsider the registration decisions. It has said INGOs run or support most of Gaza's field hospitals and primary healthcare centres, emergency shelter responses, water and sanitation services, nutrition stabilisation centres for children with acute malnutrition, and critical mine action activities. (BBC)