The head of the embattled United Nations agency for Palestinian aid blamed aid shortages in the Gaza Strip on “replacing a principled humanitarian operation with mercenaries who weaponize food assistance.”
While UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini did not specify to whom he was alluding, his and other U.N. agencies have been harshly critical of the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which emerged as a centrally distributed aid alternative to UNRWA, which has been plagued by documented ties to Hamas.
The GHF uses security contractors, many of whom are former U.S. military personnel, to guard their aid distribution sites.
The comments by Lazzarini came on the sidelines of the annual United Nations General Assembly, where UNRWA held a ministerial-level event on Thursday to attempt to close a cavernous budget deficit due to a complete donation freeze by the United States and European Union and reductions by other countries.
Israeli legislation led to the shuttering of UNRWA’s field office in Jerusalem and other UNRWA facilities, such as schools and health clinics, in the nation’s capital, along with the shutdown of communication between Israeli and UNRWA officials.
Lazzarini condemned a “fierce and well-funded disinformation campaign spearheaded by the government of Israel,” blaming it for “tarnishing” UNRWA’s reputation and the effect it had “to strangle both political support and funding for its vital work.”
As of June, UNRWA faced a funding shortfall of some $200 million.
Asked by JNS at a Thursday press briefing why Gulf Arab funding for UNRWA had taken a precipitous drop, especially this year, as Lazzarini himself pointed out at a recent League of Arab States meeting, he pointed to “a combination of factors.”
These include Gulf Arab funding patterns that point to end-of-year donations, giving Lazzarini hope that Arab states will back up with money a cause they claim publicly to support.
Lazzarini said, though, that “there is still a perception that the agency is constrained when it comes to Gaza,” and unable to carry out its mandate.
He said his comments to the League of Arab States were “more a warning. Let’s not end the year that way,” even as Arab funding has tailed off over the last five years.
Lazzarini told JNS he will be heading to Riyadh on Monday “to discuss the contribution we used to get.”
Despite hundreds of billions of dollars in international aid that have flowed to the Palestinian Authority and to the Gaza Strip, UNRWA still assumes responsibility for providing healthcare, education, humanitarian aid and cash assistance to millions of regional Palestinians.
Those Palestinians are controversially deemed “refugees” despite living in Palestinian-controlled territory, and many with a multi-generational gap between themselves and their relatives who fled or were forced out during the Arab offensives against Israel in 1948 and 1967.
Regarding the additional U.N. member states that announced this week their recognition of Palestinian statehood, JNS asked Lazzarini whether he felt that could potentially harm UNRWA, given that statehood recognition generally carries with it an understanding of a functioning state with institutions that can care for its own people, thereby no longer necessitating a role for UNRWA.
He said statehood recognition “can make a difference if, through the recognition, there is a genuine commitment to make the resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict again a priority.”
Lazzarini tacitly acknowledged Hamas’s gain via its Oct. 7, 2023, massacre in southern Israel, which sparked the Israel-Hamas war, stating, “Let’s be honest, before Oct. ‘23,” recognition of Palestinian statehood and the potential benefits he felt it could bring were “far from being a priority of the international community.”
