Israel claimed that some employees of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) were involved in the October 7 Hamas attack. In response, Gaza’s main relief agency fired a number of its staff. But beyond the allegations of recent days, Israel has long-standing problems with UNRWA, accusing it of helping Hamas and calling for its complete dismantling.
In 2017, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sought to dissolve UNRWA and merge it with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. More recently, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz suggested that Israel would seek to prevent the UN agency from working in Gaza post-war, saying it “will not be part of the day after.”
“We’ve been warning for years,” Katz said. He added, “UNRWA works to perpetuate the refugee issue, obstruct peace, and acts as a civilian arm of the Hamas movement in Gaza.”
UNRWA has repeatedly denied Israeli allegations that its aid is being diverted to Hamas and that it teaches hatred in its schools, and has questioned “the motives of those who make such allegations, through significant advocacy campaigns.” She condemned the October 7 attack, describing it as “abhorrent.” The threat of UNRWA being removed from the besieged Gaza Strip has prompted UN officials and those who rely on the agency to sound the alarm.
Yuval Shani, a professor at the Faculty of Law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, said: “Israel does not see in UNRWA anything conducive to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”
Instead, Israel views the agency as “a mechanism that perpetuates the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and specifically perpetuates the conflict regarding the right of return, by classifying refugees and their descendants from 1948…as refugees.”
The right of return refers to the right of Palestinian refugees and their descendants to return to their ancestral homes in what is now Israel, which was recognized under United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 of 1948. The fate of refugees is one of the most controversial issues in the world. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Read more On Israel’s opposition to UNRWA.
Abeer Salman in Jerusalem and Muhammad Al-Sawalhi in Gaza contributed to this report.
