The Knesset (Israeli Parliament) approved Monday evening two laws to ban the activity of the UN agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza. In a first vote, the Knesset banned UNRWA from operating on Israeli territory, including annexed East Jerusalem, before giving the green light to a second law aimed at restricting its ability to operate in areas occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza, prohibiting any government agency or public entity from having contact with this United Nations agency or its employees.
This second vote was approved by Israeli lawmakers with 87 votes for and 9 against, despite international opposition from the United States and the European Union. The law, which prohibits any Israeli official from establishing contact with UNRWA, will prevent the UN agency from continuing to conduct its educational and health work in the occupied Palestinian territories, since Israel will not issue permits to entry nor will it facilitate coordination with the army.
“This legislation threatens a vital lifeline for more than 2.5 million Palestinian refugees throughout the occupied Palestinian territoryeither. “This represents a deliberate attempt to fundamentally undermine UNRWA and its essential mission of supporting the relief, education and human development of Palestinian refugees,” the Palestinian legal organization Adalah denounced today after hearing about the two votes regarding the first approved law, with 92 votes. votes for and 10 against, it stipulates that UNRWA will not make any representations, provide any services or carry out any activities “directly or indirectly” in the sovereign territory of Israel.
Even deputies from several opposition parties, including centrist Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid (There is a future) or Benny Gantz’s National Unity. voted in favor of this ban, which, in turn, will significantly reduce UNRWA activities in Gaza and the West Bank. occupied, given the dependence on coordination with Israeli authorities.
Five million refugees receive their services
UNRWA was established in 1950 by the UN and provides social services to more than five million Palestinian refugees – many descendants of the hundreds of miles of people displaced by the creation of the State of Israel – who now live in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. UNRWA is “the backbone of humanitarian operations in Gaza,” Jonathan Fowdler, one of the organization’s spokespersons, told EFE, who stressed that without the agency’s work, 660,000 children of Gaza would lose the only entity capable of continuing their education.
Israel claims without evidence that more than 10% of UNRWA personnel in Gaza have links to Hamas and that its educational centers, many of them were bombed during the war in Gaza despite the presence of displaced Gazan civilians, incite hatred against Israel. In January, Israel said that twelve UNRWA employees actively participated in the deadly October 7 attacks, to which the agency immediately responded by opening an internal investigation and firing those employees.
The agency, which has more than 30,000 employees, assured a few months later that Israel had not presented conclusive evidence on the involvement of these workers in the attacks, while an independent investigation, led by the Former French Minister of Foreign Affairs Catherine Colonna endorsed the neutrality of the agency in March. humanitarian activity of the agency, even if it detected “critical areas”.
When Israel made such accusations in January18 countries announced that they were withdrawing their funds, including its major donors – the United States, Germany, Japan and France – resulting in a $450 million budget cut amid the emergency response in the Gaza Strip. Most countries, including Canada, Sweden, Australia and the European Union itself, resumed funding of UNRWA a few months later due to the lack of evidence presented by Israel.
