Danny Danon, the Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, accused the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs of intentionally publishing false and misleading data, and OCHA leaders of spreading slander.
“Hundreds of OCHA employees are undergoing security vetting,” Danon told the U.N. Security Council during its meeting on Wednesday. “Key employees will not have their permits renewed following clear evidence of strong affiliation with Hamas.”
Israel will no longer grant automatic visas to OCHA’s international staff, and the visas it does issue will be limited to one-month terms, Danon said.
Danon said that Jonathan Whittall, the head of OCHA’s office for the Palestinian territories, has “consistently and outrageously demonstrated his bias and agenda against the State of Israel.” The Israeli envoy told the council that Israel won’t renew Whittall’s visa, and he will have to leave the country by the end of the month.
“We will no longer allow anti-Israel activity under the guise of humanitarianism,” Danon said. “Israel will continue to protect its citizens and stand against mechanisms that promote lies, incitement and terrorism, even if they bear the U.N. logo.”
The Israeli envoy also criticized Tom Fletcher, U.N. under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, for accusing Israel of committing genocide and for the claim—which he hasn’t retracted—that Israeli aid restrictions in Gaza would lead to 14,000 dead babies in a 48-hour period.
Fletcher partly acknowledged days later that the claim was based on misinterpreted data. “His irresponsibility has infected OCHA from top to bottom,” Danon told the council.
The Israeli envoy said that Fletcher leads a disinformation campaign, which included an OCHA revision of casualty data in May that shaved off more than 10,000 purported deaths of Gazan women and children from its reporting.
“No explanation. No accountability. Just a quiet adjustment, as if the original numbers weren’t already plastered across headlines worldwide,” Danon told the council.
OCHA relies solely on Hamas data in its reporting, according to the envoy.
“There is no independent verification, no cross-checking, no effort to distinguish between civilians and terrorists,” Danon said. “This violates the U.N.’s own standards in every other conflict, but when it comes to Israel, those standards disappear.”
Doing the U.N.’s job
OCHA’s figures for aid entering Gaza, which the international press reports to assess food security conditions in the Strip, only document that which the United Nations coordinates, “ignoring the thousands of trucks of food, medical supplies and fuel that Israel, the private sector and other partners have delivered,” Danon told the council.
The Israeli envoy noted challenges in the region, including Hezbollah’s refusal to disarm and the massacre of Druze in Syria this month. He addressed Kazem Gharibabadi, deputy Iranian foreign minister for legal and international affairs.
“What is your plan now? Will you continue with your murderous agenda? Will you keep running toward a nuclear bomb?” he said. “Will you keep expanding your ballistic missiles for attacks on civilians? Will you keep pumping money into your terrorist proxies?”
Danon said that Israel played a significant role in rooting out Iran’s power in the region and “is making the Middle East safer for everyone who values peace and calm.”
“In other words, we are doing the job of the United Nations,” Danon told the council.
Dorothy Shea, interim U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said that accusations of Israeli genocide in Gaza “are politically motivated and categorically false.”
“They are part of a deliberate, cynical propaganda campaign as Hamas attempts to win symbolic victories to compensate for total defeat in war,” she told the council. ”The United States refutes these allegations entirely.”
Shea said the council “must meet the moment” in ongoing Israel-Hamas ceasefire negotiations “by pressuring Hamas to accept the ceasefire proposal already accepted by Israel, release the 50 remaining hostages held for more than 650 days, and disarm and leave Gaza forever.”
Barbara Woodward, the United Kingdom’s ambassador to the United Nations, was among the envoys who were harshly critical of Israel at the meeting.
“The IDF is shooting at desperate Palestinian civilians on an almost daily basis,” she said. (Israel has repeatedly denied that charge.)
“Hamas is exploiting this disorder,” she added.
