'No alternative to UNRWA': UN chief urges world leaders to support Agency

UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, urged world leaders on Thursday to increase support for the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), which provides essential services to nearly 6 million people, Anadolu Agency reports.

A high-level meeting, co-organised by Jordan and Sweden, in support of UNRWA was held on the margins of the UN General Assembly meetings in New York where Guterres described the situation in the Gaza Strip as “beyond imagination”.

We have failed the people of Gaza. They are in a living hell that somehow gets even worse by the day

he said.

He emphasized that “there is no alternative to UNRWA” and urged all UN member states to “work on all fronts to intensify support for the Agency’s vital mission.”

Guterres said UNRWA “is not a sustainable long-term solution to the plight of Palestine Refugees”, and reiterated his demand for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, release of hostages and a two-state political solution between Palestine and Israel, with Jerusalem as the capital of both states.

UNRWA: 625,000 children in Gaza are ‘deeply traumatised’

“But, until that moment, UNRWA remains indispensable,” he said, urging states to provide “full support”.

The UN chief said 2 million Palestinians are crammed into a small area, living amid “lakes of sewage, piles of rubbish, and mountains of rubble” and warned that “the only certainty is that tomorrow will be worse”.

Yet, if there is any outpost of hope in this hellscape, it is UNRWA

he said.

The Agency is facing immense challenges on the operational and political level, according to Guterres, who said that “222 UNRWA colleagues have been killed, many together with entire families, several in the line of duty”, and it is “the highest death toll in UN history.”

Guterres highlighted Israeli “campaigns that discredit the Agency’s life-saving work”, and noted the decision by Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, to classify UNRWA as a terrorist organisation.

Israel has repeatedly equated UNRWA staff with Hamas members in efforts to discredit them, providing no proof of the claims, while lobbying hard to have UNRWA closed as it is the only UN agency to have a specific mandate to look after the basic needs of Palestinian refugees. If the Agency no longer exists, argues Israel, then the refugee issue must no longer exist, and the legitimate right for Palestinian refugees to return to their land will be unnecessary. Israel has denied that right of return since the late 1940s, even though its own membership of the UN was made conditional upon Palestinian refugees being allowed to return to their homes and land.

“In the face of the catastrophic conditions, UNRWA perseveres,” he said.

The UN chief expressed “full confidence in UNRWA’s continued commitment to upholding the humanitarian principles of neutrality, impartiality and humanity and to implement the recommendations of the Independent Review by Catherine Colonna.”

He said UN member states are also displaying the same confidence in the Agency.

“Virtually all donors have reversed their funding suspensions,” he said. “This underscores the consensus that UNRWA’s role across the West Bank and the region is vital.”

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