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<h1 class="gmail-single_title">Israel and its allies seek to annihilate UNRWA and the Palestinian people</h1>
<div class="gmail-article-author"><h3>By <a href="https://english.palinfo.com/?p=250011"> Ramona Wadi </a></h3></div>
<p class="gmail-single_date">Monday 29-January-2024 - <font size="1"><a href="https://english.palinfo.com/opinion_articles/israel-and-its-allies-seek-to-annihilate-unrwa-and-the-palestinian-people/">https://english.palinfo.com/opinion_articles/israel-and-its-allies-seek-to-annihilate-unrwa-and-the-palestinian-people/</a></font></p>
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<p>The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on South Africa’s
legal case about Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza is
the latest example of normalizing the settler-colonial entity’s
existence and its actions. In its interim ruling, which consisted of six
provisional measures, the ICJ failed to call for a ceasefire. “Israel
must prevent and punish incitement of genocidal acts,” determined the
court in language that is much reminiscent of the UN’s futile
condemnations which have become normalized rhetoric. The wording used by
the ICJ detracts from the fact that incitement to genocide has already
led to genocidal acts, and that by now, there is an overt and prominent
web of international complicity in them.</p>
<p>Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has declared repeatedly
that Israel will continue “defending itself”, a statement that would
ring ludicrous if international law was truly upheld. For what is Israel
defending itself against? A colonized population whose legitimate right
to resist has been annihilated by the colonizer’s complicit diplomatic
allies and which is facing famine, as planned very deliberately by
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.</p>
<p>When humanitarian “pauses” became the predominant narrative and
humanitarian aid started trickling into Gaza, the relief was inadequate
and Israeli soldiers fired on Palestinians attempting to reach the
delivery trucks. In comparison to the destruction of Gaza’s
infrastructure, Israel’s attack on humanitarian aid to enforce famine
upon the Palestinian population in Gaza garnered less international
attention.</p>
<p>After the ICJ ruling, Netanyahu decided it was time to up the annihilation ante.</p>
<p>And once again, the focus is shifted away from the Palestinian people
and onto the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestine refugees,
as nine countries – the US, Switzerland, Germany, Australia, Italy,
Canada, Finland, the Netherlands and the UK – decided to suspend funding
to the agency after Israeli allegations that twelve staff members were
involved in the Hamas incursion into Israel on 7 October last year. No
evidence was presented; just allegations against twelve employees out of
30,000 across the agency’s areas of operation, upon which the nine
governments acted like the obedient lapdogs that they are.</p>
<p>A UN press release by Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s spokesman
noted that UNRWA’s Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini was asked to
investigate the allegations, and that “any UNRWA employee shown to have
participated or abetted what transpired on 7 October or in any other
criminal activity, be terminated immediately and referred for potential
criminal prosecution.” Guterres also called upon countries to resume
funding, stating, “The dire needs of the desperate populations they
serve must be met.”</p>
<p>Former UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness pointed out, though, that: “The
Israelis have said they cannot win the war on Gaza unless UNRWA is
disbanded. So what clearer signal do you want?”</p>
<p>Truthfully, Israel is in no hurry to “win” in Gaza. The more it can
extend the parameters of what violence the world will normalize, the
more Israel gains in impunity. However, Gunness makes a valid point in
reiterating Israel’s intent to have UNRWA shut down. Earlier in January,
former Israeli foreign minister official Noga Arbell called for this to
happen: “It will be impossible to win the war if we do not destroy
UNRWA.”</p>
<p>Of course, at this very precarious moment, Arbell’s words ring with
much more urgency and clarity of genocidal intent. UNRWA provides
essential services upon which Palestinian refugees depend, despite its
many shortcomings due to the agency’s existence serving the
international community’s humanitarian paradigm which, in turn, serves
Israel’s colonization plans. However, Israel’s concern is that the very
existence of UNRWA points towards its own historical trajectory of
ethnic cleansing from 1948 until today, which in turn affirms the need
for the agency. It is a cycle in which only one winner emerges, either
way, and Palestinians remain pawns in the game because UNRWA takes
priority, either because Israel calls for its dismantling, or because
Palestinians are in dire need of its services.</p>
<p>Had famine not reached Gaza, how much would Israel’s renewed attack
on the agency have garnered attention? In 2018, the Trump administration
cut off US funding for UNRWA, and allegations of embezzlement of funds
and staff misconduct surfaced to substantiate the US decision. A similar
pattern has now emerged, this time linking UNRWA staff members to
alleged involvement in the Hamas-led incursion into Israel.</p>
<p>In December, Israeli media revealed a classified foreign ministry
report seeking to eliminate UNRWA from Gaza in three steps: alleged
cooperation of UNRWA staff members with Hamas; a reduction of UNRWA
services in Gaza; and ultimately the transfer of all of the agency’s
duties to the entity governing Gaza after Israel decides that it has
quenched its thirst for death and destruction.</p>
<p>During the Trump administration, the joint US-Israeli aim was to
alter the definition of who qualifies as a Palestinian refugee.
Netanyahu has gone many steps further; without Palestinians in the
enclave, refugees or otherwise, UNRWA would not need to function in
Gaza. And this time, it has the unabashed backing of nine countries so
far, all of which are complicit in using starvation as a collective
punishment and weapon of war in Gaza. Nine countries which have
determined UNRWA’s funding levels throughout the years have now
determined a painful extermination for Palestinians.</p>
<p>The latest development should get the entire world thinking and up in
arms. What right does the UN have to determine that Palestinians only
qualify for attention under the humanitarian paradigm; and by what right
do powerful member states – many of them former colonial powers –
dictate that Palestinians in Gaza do not deserve access to the basic
essentials that they need to survive?</p>
<p>Putting UNRWA in the spotlight has been a tactic that Israel has used
frequently, and one that the UN has allowed. UNRWA exists for a purpose
that is more political than humanitarian due to the history that
founded it, and which allowed Israeli colonialism to thrive while
preventing Palestinians from their political right to return to their
land and homes. UNRWA’s almost total dependence on donor countries –
many of them Israel’s allies and all of which are two-state proponents –
has in turn forced Palestinians into what is clearly a vicious cycle of
dependency. But the focus has always been the agency’s survival as an
entity, rather than it being given the freedom to accomplish its
objectives for the benefit of Palestinian refugees. This means that
Palestinians have long been marginalized from the dominant narrative on
UNRWA as a result of Israel’s dehumanization of the population that it
has colonized for decades.</p>
<p>The UN has sounded the alarm over the funding suspension, knowing
full well that some of its member states are complicit in Israel’s aim
of destroying UNRWA to make Gaza even more susceptible to annihilation.
Since the UN’s power lies largely with the same member states whose
allegiance to Israel is paramount, what stops this collective
imperialist endeavor from committing genocide against the Palestinian
population? They are already all complicit in this most serious of
crimes.</p>
<p><em>-Ramona Wadi is an independent researcher, freelance journalist,
book reviewer and blogger. Her writing covers a range of themes in
relation to Palestine, Chile and Latin America. Her article appeared in
MEMO.</em></p>
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