Antisemitism, anti-Zionism, and other expressions of hostility are “deeply rooted” within Doctors Without Borders (MSF), claimed NGO Monitor in its new report “Documenting the Antisemitic Organizational Culture of Doctors Without Borders.”
The report documents MSF’s internal staff conversations and culture regarding Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the personal experiences of Jewish staff members within the organization.
Based on these many testimonials by MSF insiders, NGO Monitor says it is “clear that antisemitism and anti-Israel bias are widespread in MSF’s organizational culture and are expressed by both top officials and lower-level staff.”
One testimony is from former MSF Secretary-General Richard Rossin, who, on July 13, 2024, told Canada’s National Post that the ideological bias against Israel “was perceptible around the beginning of the 80’s.”
“Antisemitism within MSF began under the cover of anti-Zionism. It [the ideological shift] cannot be fixed. How can you fix antisemitism, which is not an opinion but a mental disease?” Rossin said.
MSF Holland contingent refused to interact with a fellow Israeli medical NGO team
The National Post wrote, “Rossin recalled his experience in 2010 on a mission to Uganda when an MSF Holland contingent refused to interact with a fellow Israeli medical NGO team dispatched to help. Rossin remembered it as an episode of ‘one-way empathy,’ where prejudice had poisoned the MSF team’s ability to cooperate with Israel in their shared goal of helping civilians. He feels these same issues continue to plague MSF’s mission in Gaza today.”
NGO Monitor also draws on the words of Alain Destexhe, a doctor with MSF in the 1980s and its Secretary-General in the 1990s. In an October 2025 interview, Destexhe stated: “I think now MSF in Gaza is really taking the side [of] Hamas and against Israel. Americans need to know that Doctors Without Borders is not anymore the organization that it was 15 or 20 years ago. It has become a biased, partial and militant organization.”
“MSF is lying, MSF is partial, MSF is biased, and MSF is an accomplice of Hamas.”
MICHAEL GOLDFARB, who is Jewish, spent 15 years at Doctors without Borders US. He told The Jewish Chronicle of London in March 2026 that “European colleagues freely told me, knowing I am Jewish, that Israel doesn’t have a right to exist.”
“You see extreme ideological fervour – Israel as a Nazi state, Jews as the oppressive, colonial, white supremacists, Zionism as Nazism,” Goldfarb said. “Nothing meaningful has been done to address antisemitism, to show solidarity with Jewish staff, or call out this hate. That creates a permissive environment in which it flourishes.”
Dr Estrella Lasry, a tropical medicine advisor and consultant in the Medical Branch of MSF’s Geneva headquarters from approximately 2011 to approximately 2025, said she experienced “the appalling lack of empathy in the organization towards the victims in Israel.”
“I said our communication was biased, and for an organization that claims to be impartial, it was creating a biased, skewed, false narrative around what was actually going on. It was giving a very one-sided view … I was told I was part of the ‘Israeli propaganda machine’ in a meeting, and nobody flinched.”
Antisemitism is also reportedly widespread on MSF’s closed online staff forum, known internally as “the Souk.”
Posts on MSF’s internal communication channel since October 7, 2023, include: “The fight for freedom … is about liberating the world from the grip of Zionism…”; “Israel is a “76-year-old crime scene” and “As for the accusation of rape against Palestinian resistance fighters, I believe these are propaganda.”
“Clearly, the organization has blatantly and repeatedly violated its claim to act on the basis of neutrality, impartiality, and independence, “ said NGO Monitor.
The report adds that officials routinely dismissed the evidence of systemic antisemitism and requests to take action against the hatred.
In order to address the “toxic organizational culture of antisemitism and anti-Zionism,” NGO Monitor suggests fundamental changes in MSF’s structure, leadership, and staffing at both the international level and among the many country branches and sections.
Additionally, it suggested independent oversight frameworks be established to ensure that MSF’s leaders, including board members and funder-enablers, are held accountable.
MSF told The Jerusalem Post that it understands how dangerous antisemitism is and is committed to taking it seriously.
It added that any form of bigotry or discrimination by MSF staff is unacceptable, but that it does not believe that criticism of Israeli government policies is equivalent to antisemitism.
“Our statements and reporting are based on the realities on the ground and the events witnessed by our staff and patients. MSF speaks out when governments or actors implement policies that are harmful to the health and safety of our patients or our staff. The way Israel has prosecuted this war has caused massive death and suffering among Palestinian civilians and has put our staff at risk.”
“This is inconsistent with the norms and laws of war,” MSF added.