The willful blindness of those denying the UNRWA is riddled with hate and corruption

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees does essential work in Gaza in relieving suffering. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees is riddled with employees tied to terrorist groups, is corrupt, and teaches children to hate Jews. It should not be difficult to understand that both sentences can be true.

When this is pointed out in stark terms, as in this week’s Wall Street Journal (WSJ) story, the response of many people who regard themselves as thinking, compassionate people, is to stick their fingers in their ears whilst simultaneously attacking the messenger not the message. There’s a case to be made that while the war in Gaza continues the agency needs to still operate, but to ignore that the outfit needs root and branch reform is to be wilfully blind.

The WSJ story is based on an Israeli intelligence assessment that at least 12 UNRWA staff actively participated in the mass murder and rape of civilians in Israel on Oct 7. Antony Blinken, the US Secretary of State, regards the evidence as “highly, highly credible”. At this point, some people leap to the conclusion that “they would say that wouldn’t they?”. Even worse, and shamefully, some dismiss the WSJ story not on any of the facts presented, but on the grounds that one of the journalists who wrote it did (mandatory) national service in the Israeli army. That the other is the WSJ Latin America editor appears to be overlooked.

The hard of thinking, or those of a malevolent bent, even brush past the fact that UNRWA has now sacked “several” employees accused in the report. UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini said, “Any UNRWA employee who was involved in acts of terror will be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution”, which is hardly a blanket denial of the veracity of the WSJ story and others in outlets such as the New York Times.

The reports suggest that about 1,200 of the 12,000 Gazans who work for UNRWA have ties to either Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Almost 50 per cent of staff are said to have at least one close relative in one of the groups. These accusations are considered credible enough for the US, Finland, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, Britain, Australia, Italy, and others to suspend funding to the agency, and yet the response from Hamas’s useful idiots in the outside world is to deny there is a problem.

Most will not know how the world works in a dictatorship. In Gaza, if you are a genuine, local aid worker and you see evidence of links to Hamas, who will you report this to? Hamas? Your manager in Gaza City? Not only will you risk your job, but you will also risk your life. So, nobody saw anything – ok?

Well-meaning, concerned citizens of comfortable European nations may not understand this, but journalists, who have been to such places know full well this is how things work. Yet some choose to ignore the allegations and attack the messenger instead of engaging with the message.

For example, the NYT suggests that phone records tracked a UNRWA worker to the site of the Supernova music festival where 360 people were murdered on Oct 7. Others are said to have kidnapped Israelis and taken the body of at least one dead Israeli soldier into Gaza. This is some way off the UN stipulation that staff must not engage in “any political activity which is inconsistent with or might reflect upon the independence and impartiality of the United Nations”.  Texts retrieved from other phones show UNRWA staff, who are also Hamas members, being instructed to assemble near the border fence ahead of the assault.

Seven of those accused were teachers at UNRWA schools. If true, this chimes with testimony from two freed Israeli hostages that they were held in the homes of UNRWA workers and moved from place to place via UNWRA facilities. There are also dozens of examples on social media channels of UNRWA staff gleefully celebrating the slaughter of Oct 7. For example, one urges Hamas to “execute the first settler”, another posts, “ Oh how I hate the Jews”.

The news follows years of complaints by Israel that the hundreds of schools which UNRWA runs across the Middle East incite children to celebrate martyrdom as well as providing textbooks encouraging Jew hate. Almost 100 UNRWA teachers have been disciplined for distributing hate content in schools. This is partially why the US first suspended funding to UNRWA in 2018, before re-instating it when President Biden came to power.

UNRWA is an interesting organization. It was established in 1949 following the Arab/Israeli war to provide humanitarian assistance to Palestinians displaced by the fighting. It is one of a kind because it is separate from the UN High Commission for Refugees which deals with all other refugee situations. It is also unique in that, unlike all other refugees across the world, refugee status is passed down to each generation of Palestinians no matter which country they live in. This is why there were 750,000 Palestinian refugees in 1949, and there are now more than five million and will be even more as the years pass. The Arab countries, where most Palestinian refugee countries live refuse to give them citizenship even though some have lived there for seven decades.

The funding for its operations in 58 refugee camps comes mostly from voluntary contributions of UN members. One of the biggest donors is the US which last year provided $422. The UK paid $21 million.

The agency says without the money from the countries which have suspended payments it will not be able to carry out its functions beyond the end of February. There are other agencies on the ground, but none have the capability of UNRWA especially given the dire conditions in Gaza. More than 85 per cent of citizens are said to have been displaced since Hamas triggered the war and for many, UNRWA is the only thing keeping them alive.

Israel continues to cooperate with the agency, sending in aid most days, but when the ceasefire comes, it will want a reckoning. It can expect little help from the UN itself. It is not unusual in a calendar year for the UN General Assembly to pass more resolutions condemning Israel than every other country combined. Or to put it another way, it would appear to the UN that Israel’s behaviour is worse than everything Russia, China, Syria, Iran, North Korea, Eritrea, Myanmar, Sudan, and everyone else gets up to. A good example is 2017. There were 27 condemnatory country-specific resolutions of which 21 were about…. you know who.

The agency will only be reformed if the biggest donors make enough of a fuss about it and demand proper oversight. As for the apologists seeking to whitewash corruption and violence within UNRWA? They may be so obsessed with one country that they cannot see their fixation for what it is.

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