It is undoubtedly not this report by experts commissioned by the UN on the agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) in the Gaza Strip which will put an end to the controversy. But it at least allows you to have an outside opinion. And these experts concluded that UNRWA lacks the political “neutrality” as Israel and its supporters accuse it. On the other hand, Tel Aviv, which claimed that the agency employed “more than 400 terrorists” (out of 30,000 employees) in the Gaza Strip, has not yet provided “proof” of alleged links of certain members to “organizations terrorists” like Hamas.
And above all UNRWA remains “irreplaceable and indispensable” to the Palestinians, underlined this independent group chaired by former French Minister of Foreign Affairs Catherine Colonna and charged by Secretary General Antonio Guterres with an evaluation mission on its “neutrality”. “. “UNRWA remains crucial in providing vital humanitarian assistance […] particularly in terms of health and education for Palestinian refugees in Gaza, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and the West Bank, recognizes the report. Many see UNRWA as a humanitarian lifeline. »
School books with problematic content
This report, the result of nine weeks of work in Israel, the occupied West Bank, Jordan, contains “recommendations” that Catherine Colonna presented to the press at UN headquarters in New York. “What needs to be improved will be improved. I am confident that the implementation of these measures will help UNRWA fulfill its mandate,” she said.
“Problems linked to neutrality persist,” noted the Colonna mission. These are “cases of employees publicly expressing their political opinions, school books with problematic content coming from the host country and used in certain UNRWA schools, politicized trade unionists uttering threats against UNRWA management and disrupting humanitarian operations. Catherine Colonna whispered about school books from the UN agency that are anti-Semitic, hostile to Jews or anti-Zionist.
“A rotten and poisonous tree whose roots are Hamas”
Finally, “based on a March 2024 list containing Palestinian identity numbers, Israel has publicly claimed that a significant number of UNRWA employees are members of terrorist organizations. However, Israel has yet to provide proof,” warned the Colonna mission. However, it is on the basis of these allegations that several donor countries including the United States suspended their funding, even if some have since resumed it.
Our file on the Israel-Hamas war
Unsurprisingly, Israel criticized the “Colonna report [qui] ignores the seriousness of the problem. “Hamas has infiltrated UNRWA so deeply that it is no longer possible to determine where UNRWA stops and Hamas begins,” criticized a spokesperson for Israeli diplomacy, estimating that “more than 2,135 UNRWA employees [étaient] members of Hamas or Islamic Jihad.” “The problem with UNRWA-Gaza is not a few bad apples; it is a rotten and poisonous tree whose roots are Hamas,” he denounced.
For his part, Philippe Lazzarini, head of UNRWA, promised a “strengthening of [nos] efforts and [notre] response to one of the most difficult episodes in the history of the Palestinian people.” Under pressure for months, last week he defended UNRWA before the Security Council as the “backbone of humanitarian operations” in the Gaza Strip and denounced an “insidious” campaign to put an end to it. He warned against a “dismantling” of the agency with a risk of “starvation” which already threatens the north of the Palestinian territory.