Supported by United States, Israel seeks to demolish the UNRWA in the occupied territories. It reflects the ongoing war against the poorest in the Global South.

Last Friday, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) said that The Qalandiya Training Center for hundreds of Palestinians in the West Bank could be closed within days by Israeli authorities. The Center is at risk of expropriation by Israeli authorities cooperating with the Messianic far-right Jewish settlers.

That’s why the Knesset has passed legislation banning the group from Israeli territory, barring Israeli officials from having contact with it and shutting it off from Israeli electricity and water.

Qalandiya is a part of a far bigger puzzle, the Netanyahu cabinet’s effort to deport UNRWA along with the Palestinians from the occupied territories, to set the stage for their de jure incorporation in the pre-1967 Israel. This plan was accelerated after October 7, 2023.

In May 2024, after half a year of genocidal atrocities in Gaza, Israeli settlers launched several attacks on the headquarters of the UNRWA, setting fire to the perimeter of the building in East Jerusalem. The attacks came after months of far-right settler protests outside of the building. 

The UN General Assembly established the UNRWA in 1949 with a temporary mandate, to provide humanitarian assistance, protection, and education to registered Palestinian refugees (more than 5.9 million today) living in the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria.

About 1.4-1.6 million of Gaza’s more than 2.1 million residents are registered Palestinian refugees. With no political resolution on the refugees’ status, the General Assembly has regularly extended UNRWA’s mandate, which is currently set to expire on June 20, 2026.

The agency was created in the aftermath of what Israel calls its Independence War and what the Palestinians call Nakba, the great catastrophe in which 750,000 Palestinian Arabs were displaced and dispossessed in what became Israel.

After achieving an initial truce in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Count Folke Bernadotte, a Swedish diplomat, used it to lay the groundwork for the UNRWA. 

Just hours after his proposal, Bernadotte was assassinated in Jerusalem by the Jewish paramilitary Stern group, while pursuing his official duties. One of those who planned the killing was Yitzhak Shamir, the future prime minister of Israel, the predecessor and onetime mentor of Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s current PM.

Ever since then, UNRWA has served as a humanitarian lifeline to generations of Palestinians in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and the adjacent Arab countries. 

Created as a temporary measure, UNRWA’s mandate has been subject to renewal every three years. It is funded primarily through voluntary contributions from governments (95%) and the UN regular budget (5%). UNRWA’s 2024 program budget was for $880.2 million; in addition, emergency funding appeals, primarily for Gaza, totaled $1.6 billion. 

Prior to October 7, 2023, the U.S. accounted for almost 30% of the total. Historically, the United States has been UNRWA’s largest financial contributor, with more than $7.3 billion since 1950. The Trump administration considers such funding waste. Yet, the U.S. military aid to Israel has amounted to $4 billion annually; and since October 7, 2023, total military aid has soared to $21.7 billion.

From the start, these contributions have been subject to a........

© Eurasia Review