The Israeli parliament has passed two laws that could prevent the United Nations Relief Agency for Palestine Refugees, the main aid provider to Gaza, from continuing its work.
The laws prevent UNRWA from operating, and sever all relations between the agency and the Israeli government. It is the culmination of a long-running campaign against the agency, which Israel claims was infiltrated by Hamas. But supporters say Israel’s real goal is to marginalize the Palestinian refugee issue.
The agency is the main distributor of aid in Gaza and provides education, health and other basic services to millions of Palestinian refugees across the region, including in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The agency’s head, Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini, called the move “unprecedented” on X after the vote and said the bills “will only deepen the suffering of Palestinians, especially in Gaza where people have been going through more than a year of absolute hell.” “.
Israel accuses the agency of turning a blind eye to employees it says belong to Hamas, diverting aid and using UNRWA facilities for military purposes. Israel says about ten of its 13,000 employees in Gaza participated in the October 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel. The agency denies that it is intentionally aiding armed groups and says it is moving quickly to clear any suspected militants among its staff.
The bills severely hamper UNRWA
One of the draft laws passed Monday evening bans all UNRWA activities and services on Israeli territory, and is scheduled to take effect within three months.
The second draft law cuts all ties between government employees and UNRWA and strips its employees of their legal immunity.
Taken together, the bills would likely prevent the agency from operating in Israel and the Palestinian territories, because Israel controls access to both Gaza and the West Bank. This could force the agency to move its headquarters from East Jerusalem, which was annexed by Israel.
Lazzarini warned earlier this month that humanitarian operations in Gaza “could disintegrate” if the legislation was passed, disrupting the provision of food, shelter and health care as winter sets in.
Gaza’s population of about 2.3 million depends almost entirely on aid to survive. About 90% of the population has been displaced. Hundreds of thousands of people live in camps and schools turned into shelters, most of which are managed by UNRWA. Experts say hunger is widespread. The Israeli campaign on Gaza in response to the October 7 attack led to the deaths of more than 43,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, whose statistics do not differentiate between civilians and militants.
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Israel is reportedly considering taking over or subcontracting aid distribution itself, but has not yet put forward a concrete plan. Any such effort would likely require a large number of troops and other resources at a time when Israel is locked in a conflict on two fronts in Gaza and Lebanon.
Other UN agencies and relief organizations say there is no alternative to UNRWA, which also runs 96 schools hosting about 47,000 students, three vocational training centers and 43 health centers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
A decades-old mission rooted in the bitter history of the conflict
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East was established to assist an estimated 700,000 Palestinians who fled or were expelled from what is now Israel during the 1948 war that followed Israel’s creation.
UNRWA supporters say that Israel hopes to erase the Palestinian refugee issue by dismantling the agency. Israel says the refugees must be permanently resettled outside its borders.
Palestinians say the refugees and their descendants, who now number about 6 million, should be allowed to exercise their right under international law to return to their homes. Israel rejects this, saying that the result will be a Palestinian majority within its borders.
This issue was among the thorniest issues in the peace process, which was halted in 2009.
UNRWA runs schools, health clinics, infrastructure projects and aid programs in refugee camps that have developed into urban neighborhoods in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan.
A long-standing dispute over UNRWA’s neutrality
Israel says that hundreds of Palestinian militants work for UNRWA, without providing evidence, and that more than a dozen employees participated in the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023.
UNRWA immediately expelled staff accused of participating in the October 7 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people and kidnapped about 250 others.
An independent investigation earlier this year concluded that UNRWA had “robust” mechanisms to ensure its neutrality, but pointed to gaps in implementation, including staff members openly expressing political views and textbooks with “problematic content” in UNRWA-run schools.
UNRWA says it thoroughly investigates any allegations of wrongdoing and holds employees accountable, and that it provides lists of the names of all its employees to Israel and host countries. It says Israel has largely ignored its requests to provide evidence of its allegations against the employees.
Israel has repeatedly bombed United Nations schools that have been turned into shelters, claiming that Hamas fighters are operating inside them. It also says it has uncovered tunnels running near or under UNRWA facilities.
UNRWA has long been the largest single employer in Gaza, where residents are impoverished by years of Israeli and Egyptian blockades. Hamas has ruled the region since 2007, and carries out civilian political operations alongside its armed wing.
The armed wings of Hamas and other groups are highly secretive, and their members are almost unknown outside intelligence agencies. This complicates efforts by civic organizations to vet employees.
Fath Sharif, an UNRWA teacher in southern Lebanon, was killed last month along with his family in an Israeli air strike. It later emerged that he was a senior Hamas leader, something he kept secret.
Lazzarini, the UNRWA director, said that Sharif was suspended without pay in March after the agency learned that he belonged to the Hamas political party, and an investigation was opened. He said that he did not know that Sharif was a militant leader until after his death.
UNRWA enjoys strong international support
Several Western countries suspended their funding to UNRWA after the allegations related to the October 7 attack. All countries except the United States, which was its largest donor, have since recovered it.
The Biden administration recently warned Israel that if it did not allow more aid into Gaza, it could lose some of the crucial US military aid it has relied on throughout the war.
The letter sent by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to their Israeli counterparts said that they shared Israel’s concerns about “serious allegations” regarding the participation of UNRWA employees in the October 7 attack and “Hamas’ misuse of UNRWA facilities.”
But she said imposing restrictions on the bills “would destroy the humanitarian response in Gaza at this critical moment… which could have implications under relevant US law and policy.”
A joint statement from Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Japan, South Korea and Britain last week expressed “grave concern” about the legislation. She said the agency provides “essential, life-saving humanitarian assistance,” without which provision would be “severely hindered, if not impossible.”
Frankel and Leidman reported from Jerusalem.
