Middle East: UNRWA chief warns of winter famine in Gaza

The head of the UN Palestinian relief agency UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, has announced a further review of the humanitarian situation Gaza Strip warned. “In the coming winter there is a threat of hunger and malnutrition in the Palestinian territory,” said Lazzarini at a press conference in Berlin. This is avoidable: “Hunger in Gaza is artificially created,” said Lazzarini.

Recently, fewer aid convoys have reached the Gaza Strip, especially in the north of the area, where there is currently intense fighting again, he said. Before the situation of the children in Gaza, they are extremely precarious, they live between sewage and garbage.

Lazzarini did not want to comment on the question of the extent to which Israel was certainly causing hunger in Gaza. Regarding the question of whether the Israeli military is committing war crimes or even genocide in Gaza, the UNRWA chief referred to the International Criminal Court in The Hague, who is currently dealing with relevant allegations.

Warning of dissolution of UNRWA

Lazzarini clearly criticized the Israeli parliament’s plans to disband UNRWA in the occupied Palestinian territories. Lazzarini warned against such a step and its significance beyond the Middle East. If the aid organization were to be pushed out of the region, similar attacks on UN institutions could be repeated elsewhere, he warned. He calls on the UN member states to provide further political and financial support for the aid organization.

UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East) is considered the most important international aid organization for Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. Among other things, it operates health facilities and schools there. There is considerable criticism of the organization. Israel accuses the UN aid agency in Gaza of infiltration by Hamas. According to Israeli sources, at least 19 UNRWA employees – many of them teachers working for the aid organization – are said to be involved in the attack of Hamas on Israel on October 7, 2023. Important UNRWA donors such as Germany and the USA are temporarily suspending their payments to UNRWA because of the allegations. The Swiss non-governmental organization UN Watch, which is considered pro-Israel, accuses some other UNRWA employees of celebrating the Hamas massacre on October 7, 2023 and diverting humanitarian aid to the Palestinian civilian population.

Regarding the Israeli allegations against the 19 employees, Lazzarini said that an internal investigation had found no evidence of involvement in the Hamas massacre in half of the cases. Investigations into the other half were “ambiguous,” and involvement of these employees in the attack on Israel cannot be ruled out. Lazzarini pointed out that all 19 accused employees had been fired. Some of them have now been killed in the Gaza war and some are in Israeli custody.

Aid organization with neutrality problem

The United Nations had set up an independent investigative committee in response to allegations. In April, he certified that the Palestinian relief organization had “problems with neutrality”. The committee chair and former French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna referred, among other things, to political statements by UNRWA employees and the attempted influence of politicized unions on the aid agency. Colonna also pointed to problematic content in UNRWA school textbooks.

Years ago, anti-Semitic and terror-glorifying content was discovered in textbooks that were also used in UNRWA-run schools in Gaza. However, the investigative commission said it did not find any evidence of systematic infiltration of the aid organization by Hamas supporters.

Lazzarini said UNRWA is working hard to implement the Colonna Committee’s 15 recommendations. Progress has already been made, including in the review by employees. Regarding the textbook allegations, he said: “The teaching of anti-Semitism in our classrooms has absolutely no place.” UNRWA would take action against it if confronted with it.