As Some Seek to Dismantle UNRWA, Others Look to Fund the Terrorist UN Agency

Could it possibly be true that UNRWA is the reason for that?

On October 7, Israel was brutally attacked by thousands of Hamas terrorists, some of whom were employed by UNRWA. The UNRWA leadership doesn't deny that, but it says they are "reforming" the agency to prevent it from happening again.

The European Union took that as gospel and is now ready to disburse 50 million euros worth of aid through UNRWA.

“Following exchanges with the Commission, UNRWA has also indicated that it stands ready to ensure that a review of its staff is carried out to confirm they did not participate in the attacks and that further controls are put in place to mitigate such risks in the future."

For the record, Israel proved pretty conclusively that at least 12 UNRWA employees took part in the October 7 attack.

“UNRWA has agreed to the launch of an audit of the Agency to be conducted by EU-appointed external experts. This audit will review the control systems to prevent the possible involvement of its staff and assets in terrorist activities,” the commission said.

Jerusalem Post:

Based on this the Commission decided to move forward with payments to UNRWA in 2024. It has also agreed to allocate an additional EUR 68 million to organizations such as the Red Cross and the Red Crescent.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said, “We stand by the Palestinian people in Gaza and elsewhere in the region. Innocent Palestinians should not have to pay the price for the crimes of terrorist group Hamas. They face terrible conditions putting their lives at risk because of lack of access to sufficient food and other basic needs. That is why we are reinforcing our support to them this year by a further EUR 68 million.”

The New York Sun reports that, "Out of about 12,000 UNRWA workers at Gaza, 440 are active in the military wing of Hamas, the Israeli government reports. Roughly 2,000 more are registered as Hamas operatives, and another 7,000 have a first-degree relative who is a member of the terrorist group."

And the EU is about to hand over another 50 million euros to the terrorists. Why?

Common decency and humanitarian reasons animate the need for the EU and the U.S. to supply Palestinian civilians with subsistence living. They will quite simply die otherwise.

The EU can't envision a future without UNRWA. But literally anything would be better. Unfortunately, the EU does not have the imagination or foresight to change.

UNRWA is not only lousy with terrorists, it's a monumental mess of mismanagement. To expect reform is futile. The agency has been this way since its start.

The agency is undergoing both internal and independent investigations, ordered by the UN. If history is any guide, however, those charged with mismanaging Unrwa tend to swing through the revolving doors of the world’s governing body. Just look at the promotion of Pierre Krahenbuhl as the next director-general of the Red Cross after he resigned from the leadership of Unrwa in 2019 following an internal probe over “management issues.”

The International Summit on the Future Beyond UNRWA believes that the agency is unnecessary for the disbursement of food and other aid to Gazans. There are better-run agencies like the International Red Cross and Red Crescent that can do the job without the corruption and dangerous connections to terrorsts.

As the future of multilateralism hangs in balance, the UN now seems out of touch with a worldwide sense that it has been a failure. Ending the UN’s Relief and Works Agency is the first best chance it has to address this awakening. More than 134,000 signatories of a petition to replace the agency urge that aid flow through other health and food programs that operate at Gaza. As UN Watch’s heroic Hillel Neuer puts it: “Enough is enough.”

The first step has to be recognition by UNRWA enablers in the West that the agency has to go. All else flows from that.