2024-01-28 16:52:08
► What are the accusations against UNRWA?
Friday January 26, the United Nations agency at the heart of the distribution of aid to civilians in the Gaza Strip and under the fire of fighting between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement, announced that it had received information from ‘Israel on “the supposed involvement of several of its employees” in the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023. “To protect the agency’s ability to deliver humanitarian assistance, I have decided to immediately terminate the contracts of these staff members and open an investigation,” indicated in a press release the head of the agency, Philippe Lazzarini.
Washington demanded “a rapid and thorough investigation” and suspended “temporarily” any additional funding to the UN agency, bringing with it Canada, Australia, Italy, the United Kingdom, Finland, Iceland, the Netherlands, Germany and France. For his part, the head of Israeli diplomacy Israel Katz affirmed on Saturday on X (formerly Twitter) that UNRWA no longer had a future in the Gaza Strip.
For the UNRWA spokesperson, “if the agency was unable to function, which is likely, it would have no choice but to inform the General Assembly and the Secretary-General of the United Nations and, given that Israel is the occupying power, it has specific responsibilities towards the occupied population, as the International Court of Justice told us, which it would be expected to respect.”
► In what context do Israel’s accusations take place?
“The timing of the accusations against UNRWA is very surprising, notes Johann Soufi, human rights lawyer, former head of UNRWA’s legal affairs office. It is concomitant with the decision of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) which judicially noted, Friday January 26, the plausible risk that Israel would commit genocide in the Gaza Strip. In its decision, the ICJ was based in particular on several UNRWA reports and, the same day, Israel accused the UN agency. It is no longer a secret that Israel’s stated policy is to remove, by force, Palestinian refugees from Gaza as far as possible from Israel’s borders and to put an end to the mandate of UNRWA which is to protect these refugees. »
Johann Soufi does not dispute “that within UNRWA, which employs more than 13,000 people in Gaza, almost exclusively Palestinian refugees, it is possible that a tiny minority promotes hatred or participates in violent acts. This does not seem improbable to me, but absolutely does not justify attributing these acts to the organization, or dismantling it as Israel demands. he explains.
The human rights lawyer also underlines the virtual impossibility of carrying out the investigation while the war continues in the Gaza Strip and access is prohibited. Under normal conditions, an independent department within UNRWA would lead the investigation. But, he continues, “the accusations are so serious in this case that the investigation could be entrusted to an independent mechanism completely outside the agency”.
► What is the role of UNRWA in Gaza?
The UN Program for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) was established in 1949 by the UN General Assembly following the establishment of the State of Israel in May 1948, providing humanitarian assistance and protection to the more than 700,000 Palestinian refugees expelled or who fled their lands between April and August 1948. These refugees and their descendants have the status of refugees. UNRWA also intervenes in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. To date, it is the only default guarantor of the international status of refugees.
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