At a donor conference in New York, UN Secretary-General Guterres urgently called for more money for the Palestinian relief agency UNRWA. He urged Israel and Hamas to agree to a ceasefire.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres has called for more support and better security measures for the Palestinian relief agency UNRWA. “Without the necessary support and funding from UNRWA, Palestinian refugees will lose an essential support and the last glimmer of hope for a better future,” Guterres said at a donor conference in New York.
He also called on Israel and Hamas again to maintain a ceasefire and release Israeli hostages. “Nothing justifies the horrific Hamas attacks of October 7. And nothing justifies the collective punishment of the Palestinian people,” said Guterres. The chaos in Gaza affects every Palestinian there and all those who are desperately trying to help them.
“Nowhere is safe. Everywhere is a potential death zone,” said Guterres. “It is high time for the parties involved to show the political courage and political will to finally find an agreement.”
UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini estimated that the UN relief agency’s budget needed by the end of the year would be around $1.2 billion. Currently, only 20 percent of the funding has been secured, said Lazzarini.
The UNRWA mission to assist Palestinians was founded in 1949. In addition to its work in Gaza, the aid agency also works in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and the West Bank.
UNRWA hit the headlines in January. Israel accused twelve of the agency’s employees of being involved in the October 7 massacre in Israel. Another accusation was that the Islamist Hamas had infiltrated the agency as a whole. An audit report by independent experts concluded that UNRWA had established “robust” mechanisms to uphold its principle of neutrality. But there was room for improvement.
On Thursday, the Israeli embassy in Berlin announced that 108 UNRWA employees had been identified who were also believed to be active in the terrorist organization Hamas. A list of their names had been presented to UNRWA chief Lazzarini, it said.
