Yeah, the first thing I would consider. Is it appropriate.
Is there any way for very many of these opponents to know you are a witch or at least a spell caster. That could theoretically let them know that the small animal is a weak point. If you have a reputation, are fighting an experienced thief, another caster, etc... It is reasonable. Maybe a bit extra, but I would suggest just rolling with it.
Invisibility, or other things to help him hide. Put him in your backback or inside your coat when you don't have him on task. Craft or commission a magic item to serve as a familiar pocket. A few defensive magic items.
But if you've just encountered a bunch of orcs and ogres who don't know anything about you or magic and they immediatly target the fox... Well, then that is time to have a talk with the GM.
Almost forgot.
Summon minor monster spell. Anytime you think you are in a fight with something that might be intelligent, knowledgeable, or sneaky enough to target the fox. Summon a bunch of them.
You could buy extra small animals to confuse enemies.
If the enemies still target your familiar, above all others, then you need a sit down with the DM.
This made me laugh, all i could think of was a witch throwing a sack of crazed badgers into the middle of a combat situation.
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Improved Familiar to apply a Resolute, Celestial, Fiendish or Entropic template; those all give some DR (from level 5 on) and resistance to 2-3 elements. If possible, I'd recommend Resolute, because it protects against Cold and Fire (and the rarer Acid).
Pick up skills like Stealth to the point where the familiar (with usually, +8 size bonus, +3 class bonus, +2 dex bonus) just can't be found if it hides; teach it to flee combat and seek shelter until the dust settles.
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Also, talk with the GM about reasonableness of targeting the familiar. What are the NPCs' motives? If they're fighting your team life or death, it's not very reasonable to go for the familiar instead of for the witch that's about the Slumber/Evil Eye them, or to go for the familiar instead of the barbarian. While hurting the familiar hurts you in the long term, it doesn't actually save them from death right now.
There are some reasons why they'd go after your familiar of course;
* This is just a skirmish; they expect to kill the familiar, escape and attack you again later, while you're out of spells. That's only reasonable if they think they can escape.
* They're actually a suicide squad sent by the BBEG. Because if they can't defeat you for real, they shouldn't expect to survive an assassination attempt on the familiar. This requires rather fanatical minions.
* They want to take the familiar hostage; in that case it makes more sense to go for the grapple than to throw AoE spells at them. Because once you kill the hostage the SWAT team goes berserk...
* Pure spite. They know they're going to die, but they want to inflict some damage. This should be a pretty rare motivation; most people would rather try to escape or surrender. But some GMs have "NPCs fight to the death" syndrome.
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Anyway, you mentioned Ice Storm: it doesn't allow a saving throw, so no Evasion...
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You could switch to the Scarlet Spider familiar, then confuse foes with Vomit Swarm and Summon Swarm.
Also, those are good spells.
At this point, if your DM has enemies attacking your familiar still, then he is just being a dick.