Several key donor countries have announced that they will halt funding to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees following Israel’s allegations that staff members took part in Hamas’s October 7 attack.
Donors including Germany, Britain, Italy, Australia and Finland have followed the lead of the United States, which said Friday it had suspended additional funding to the agency over the accusations.
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, employs thousands of staffers and provides vital aid and services to millions of people across the Middle East. In Gaza, it has been the main supplier of food, water and shelter to civilians during the Israel-Hamas war.
Israel’s Allegations Against UN Agency
Israel has long railed against the agency, accusing it of tolerating or even collaborating with Hamas and of perpetuating the 75-year-old Palestinian refugee crisis.
The Israeli government has accused Hamas and other militant groups of siphoning off aid and using UN facilities for military purposes. Tel Aviv accuses UNRWA of turning a blind eye as Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, siphons off aid intended for civilians and fights from in and around UN facilities, several of which have been struck during the war.
It also has exposed Hamas tunnels running next to or under UNRWA facilities and accuses the agency of teaching hatred of Israel in its schools.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the agency should be shut down. But his government has continued to allow UNRWA to operate in the West Bank and Gaza, where it provides basic services that might otherwise be the responsibility of Israel as the occupying power.
UNRWA denies those allegations and says it took swift action against the employees accused of taking part in the attack. The United States and eight other Western nations that together provided more than half of UNRWA’s budget in 2022 nevertheless suspended their funding to the agency.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says 2 million Palestinians in Gaza, or 87% of the population, rely on UNRWA services that would be scaled back as soon as February if the money is not restored.
Relations between Israel and UNRWA have been strained for years but deteriorated in recent days, with the UN body condemning tank shelling it said had hit a shelter for displaced people in Gaza’s main southern city of Khan Yunis.
What Is UNWRA And Why Was It Created?
The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East was established to provide aid to the estimated 700,000 Palestinians who fled or were driven out of what is now Israel during the 1948 war surrounding the country’s creation.
The Palestinians say the refugees and their descendants, who now number nearly 6 million across the Middle East, have the right to return to their homes.
Israel has refused, because if the right of return were to be fully implemented it would result in a Palestinian majority inside its borders. The fate of the refugees and their descendants was among the thorniest issues in the peace process, which ground to a halt in 2009.
UNRWA operates schools, health clinics, infrastructure projects and aid programs in refugee camps that now resemble dense urban neighbourhoods in Gaza, the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. It has 13,000 employees in Gaza alone, the vast majority of them Palestinians.
In Gaza, where some 85% of territory’s 2.3 million people have fled their homes, over 1 million are sheltering in UNRWA schools and other facilities.
Did UNRWA Participate in October 7 Attacks?
12 UNRWA employees are said to have participated in the surprise Oct. 7 attack in which Hamas fighters from Gaza overran Israel’s extensive border defences.
UN chief Guterres said nine of the accused UNRWA employees were immediately terminated, one was confirmed dead and the other two still need to be identified. He said all would be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution.
However, neither the details of the allegations nor the evidence supporting them has been made public. Earlier this month, before the latest allegations, UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini announced an external review of the agency to determine which accusations are “true or untrue” and “what is politically motivated.”
What Do the Funding Cuts Mean For Gaza?
The US, which was the first country to suspend funding, is the biggest donor to UNRWA, providing it with $340 million in 2022. The UK, Canada, Australia, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Finland have also suspended aid.
The nine countries together provided nearly 60% of UNRWA’s budget in 2022. It was not immediately clear when or how the suspension of aid would affect the agency’s day-to-day operations. Norway and Ireland said they would continue funding UNRWA, while other donors have not yet made a decision.
The war has plunged Gaza into a severe humanitarian crisis. One in four Palestinians in the territory faces starvation, according to UN officials, who say aid operations are hampered by the fighting and Israeli restrictions.
The war has killed more than 26,000 Palestinians, most women and children, and wounded more than 64,400 others, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The death toll includes more than 150 UNWRA employees, the most aid workers the UN has lost in a single conflict.
(With inputs from agencies)
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