With UNRWA under siege, West Bank Refugees face shaky future : Claire Parker / Washington Post

Article shared by John Gilmartin

UNRWA is not a typical UN agency, it employs about 15,000 Palestinians who live in the occupied territories of modern Israel. They are mainly teaching staff, and medical staff in the UN run schools and hospitals.  Since October 7, almost 200 UNWRA staff have been killed.  This  is more than all the journalists killed covering the war.  It is almost the number of Israeli soldiers lost in combat.  (I believe now it is 280).  Total of all Palestinians killed now exceeds 30,000.  

For reasons I never understood the media and people who read news are interested in numbers of dead .  The UN routinely is asked to provide accurate death tolls a crisis has passed.  Almost without exception, the early numbers published in the news turn out to be underestimated.  Usually the final numbers are much higher.  

The leadership of UNRWA do not dispute that some of their staff participated in the Oct 7 attack.  Unusually, these staff were immediately terminated by UNWRA.  Normally, a staff member accused would be suspended.  Immediate termination is almost unheard of.  Palestinian staff in UNWRA would not have diplomatic immunity, if they did their firing would have been more difficult .  Most Palestinian staff earn very small incomes, about $1,000 a year.

As you'll see in this piece, UNRWA is now strangled.  The international professional staff who manage all agency staff are now working within one month visas from Israel.  All of their housing is in Israel, outside the Gaza.  This means the managers responsible for relief can only travel in Gaza with strict contro by Israel.  And, they are aware they can be removed without cause with one months notice.  

Every November 11 the leadership of the UN hold a ceremony to commemorate staff killed on duty during the prior twelve months.  It's a small quiet ceremony on the lawn of the building.  During my years, the 'normal' number of staff killed was around ten or 12.  

Today, this war is six months old, and all previous UN records have been shattered.

John Gilmartin

Click here for the article in the Washington Post

The potential collapse of UNRWA would be devastating for more than 6 million Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria, who rely on its schools, healthcare, food assistance and other vital services. It could force many refugees into even more dire circumstances.

UNRWA's future is deeply intertwined with the unresolved issue of Palestinian refugees' rights. Its closure would be seen by many Palestinians as the loss of an important institution that upholds their political cause and right of return.

Excerpt:

"UNRWA was meant to be temporary, built to one day hand over its activities to a Palestinian government. Its schools are based on the curriculum of the Palestinian Authority, the Ramallah-based body with limited governing powers over the West Bank. On a technical level, UNRWA could transfer its West Bank facilities to the Palestinian Authority “overnight,” Bouloukos said.

But the authority is itself broke and struggling to pay staff salaries.

As the occupying power in the West Bank, Bouloukos said, “it should be the Israelis that are cleaning the trash and doing all these other social services.”

Israel has shown no appetite for doing so in the West Bank."