UN urges donors to keep funding Palestinian agency, will punish staff involved in Oct 7 attack

DOHA/GENEVA - United Nations officials and aid groups called for countries to reconsider their decision to pause funding for the UN refugee agency for Palestinians on Jan 28, warning that its life-saving aid for some two million people in Gaza was in jeopardy.

At least nine countries, including top donors the United States and Germany, have

paused funding for the UN refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA)

following allegations by Israel that

some of its staff were involved in the deadly Oct 7 Hamas attacks on Israel

that killed 1,200 people.

“While I understand their concerns – I was myself horrified by these accusations – I strongly appeal to the governments that have suspended their contributions to at least guarantee the continuity of UNRWA’s operations,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Jan 28, vowing to hold to account “any UN employee involved in acts of terror”.

Mr Guterres said 12 staff had been implicated and that nine had been fired, one was dead and the identities of the other two were being clarified. He promised a thorough investigation into the allegations.

Mr Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA commissioner-general, also urged countries to reconsider funding suspensions.

“It would be immensely irresponsible to sanction an agency and an entire community it serves because of allegations of criminal acts against some individuals, especially at a time of war, displacement and political crises in the region,” Mr Lazzarini said in a statement.

“The lives of people in Gaza depend on this support and so does regional stability,” he added.

More than 26,000 people have been killed in Israel’s military campaign against Hamas in Gaza, the enclave’s health ministry said.

With flows of aid like food and medicine into the territory just a trickle of pre-conflict levels, deaths from preventable diseases as well as the risk of famine are growing, aid officials say.

Since the Oct 7 conflict began, most of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have become reliant on the aid UNRWA provides, including about one million sheltering in its facilities after fleeing Israeli bombardments.

Some Palestinians expressed anger at the funding cuts.

“We used to say Israel was launching a war of famine against us in parallel to its war of destruction. Now, those countries who suspended the aid to UNRWA declared themselves partners in this war and collective punishment,” said Mr Yamen Hamad, who lives at a UNRWA-run school in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza Strip, after fleeing northern Gaza.

Mr Michael Fakhri, a UN-appointed expert on the right to food, warned on social media platform X that the funding cuts meant that famine was now “inevitable” in Gaza.

Ms Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories, said the funding pause contravened the order by the International Court of Justice to allow effective humanitarian assistance to reach Gazans.

“This will entail legal responsibilities – or the demise of the (international) legal system,” she wrote on X.

Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz on Jan 27 called for the agency to be replaced and urged for more countries to cut funding.

Israel has not yet publicly given details of UNRWA staff’s alleged involvement in the attack on Israel.

Deputy UN spokesman Farhan Haq declined to respond directly to Mr Katz’s remarks but said UNRWA overall had a strong record.

There was no immediate sign of countries’ heeding the UN call to reinstate aid, although Norway and Ireland said they would continue funding the agency.

British Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch on Jan 28 said there was “clearly a problem” with the agency.

“There have been very significant allegations made that people from the UN’s relief works agency participated in or had privy knowledge of the Oct 7 attacks,” she told Sky News.

“That is extremely serious, and I think it is quite right that we suspend payments to them.”

But Britain will continue funding other humanitarian organisations working within Gaza, including the Red Cross and Unicef, she said.

UNRWA was set up to help refugees of the 1948 war at Israel’s founding and provides education, health and aid services to Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.

A vast majority of UNRWA’s 30,000-strong staff is Palestinian, with 13,000 of those in Gaza.

The US is UNRWA’s single biggest donor, having contributed more than US$296 million (S$398 million) to the group in 2023.

The agency has long been regarded with suspicion by Israel and Republicans in the US, who argue that it only fuels the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and that money going to food, education and healthcare frees up Hamas to fund hostilities against Israel.

That argument has continued as Israeli forces in Gaza uncover more evidence of tunnels and supplies buried beneath the territory.

While criticism over UNRWA’s role in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict became even more charged after the Oct 7 attack, the agency has also paid a heavy price in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, with more than 150 of its staff killed in the violence.

Fighting continued raging across Gaza on Jan 28. Palestinian medics and residents said Israel continued to bomb areas around the two main hospitals in Khan Younis, hindering efforts by rescue teams to respond to desperate calls from people caught in the Israeli bombardment.

More families were displaced from Khan Younis. Some people took dirt roads to get closer to the city of Rafah along the border with Egypt or Deir Al-Balah to the north. Others headed west to an area called Al-Mawasi, where residents described being crammed into a small area.

“It is as crowded as it can get,” said electrician Abu Raouf, a father of four.

“People have lost their ability to think, their ability to feel, they are moving like robots. It is just a matter of time before Israel sends tanks into here as well. There is no place safe.” REUTERS, BLOOMBERG