Petition to Stop Funding UNRWA
What happens when well-meaning Western donors feed money to a UN agency that turns a blind eye to terrorism? The numbers tell the story.
On October 7th:
- 133 UNRWA school graduates invaded Israel to murder and kidnap Israeli civilians
- 12 UNRWA staff directly participated in the massacre
- 2 UNRWA teachers held hostages captive in their own homes
- 30 UNRWA teachers publicly celebrated the violence on social media
- 1,200 UNRWA staff quietly helped Hamas with cars, weapons, money, information, and hideouts
PETITION
His Excellency Mr. António Guterres
Secretary-General United Nations
New York, NY 10017
Your Excellency,
I was horrified to learn that UN employees directly participated in the October 7th massacre, held Israeli hostages captive in their own homes, and celebrated the massacre on social media. It is unacceptable that the United Nations has thousands of terrorists on its payroll, and that it uses donor money to indoctrinate generations of Palestinian children into Hamas’ radical ideology.
The UN cannot sweep away these allegations with a perfunctory “investigation.” This antisemitic agency must be immediately defunded. No donor money should be restored until and unless UNRWA is radically restructured and reformed! Don’t restore funding to UNRWA without:
- New mandate that promotes acceptance of Israel’s existence
- UNESCO-approved curriculum that promotes peace and tolerance, not Jew hatred
- Purge all terror-affiliates from the payroll
- Routine independent audits of all facilities and finances
- An independent ombudsperson to investigate claims of whistleblowers
The people of Gaza deserve better than UNRWA. They deserve food, medicine, education, and shelter delivered by transparent organizations that are not routinely infiltrated by terrorists. They deserve to receive humanitarian aid and not see most of it stolen by Hamas. They deserve schools that promote coexistence with Jews and other minorities in the Middle East.
I support sending aid to Gaza through the World Food Program and UNHCR in the meantime. Thank you for your attention to this important issue.
STOP FUNDING HAMAS THROUGH UNRWA!
Facts that you must know about UNRWA.
Did you know that the UN has a separate agency that only serves Palestinians? There is no other people group in the world that gets their own UN agency. This organization is now on the 76th year of its original 3-year mandate. Instead of helping Palestinians settle down and build peaceful communities, for decades UNRWA has used money from generous Western donors to perpetuate the conflict under the guise of “humanitarianism.”
Did you know that UNRWA created its own definition of “refugee” status? In the rest of the world, refugees are people who are forced to flee their country of origin. They are served by the UN’s Refugee agency, which helps them gain citizenship and adjust to their new lives in new places. But UNRWA doesn’t want Palestinians to adjust to reality. If they did, UNRWA would go out of business! Instead it extends “refugee” status to the original refugees’ great-great-grandchildren, and beyond. Thanks to UNRWA, there are scores of Palestinian millionaires who hold multiple foreign passports, yet are still
Did you know that UNRWA runs 278 schools for 291,000 Gazan children? In these schools, the UN teaches Palestinian children that they are “refugees,” even though they are Palestinians living on Palestinian land. UNRWA praises terrorists who kill Jews, celebrates martyrdom, and teaches students that one day Israel will be destroyed.
Did you know that UNRWA almost exclusively hires Palestinians? No Jews allowed! Every other UN agency is staffed by people from around the world. This helps UN agencies maintain genuine “neutrality” in conflict zones that are full of political tension. But UNRWA is unique. Over 99% of its employees are Palestinian nationals. According to Israeli intelligence, approximately 15% of adult males in Gaza have ties to Hamas. But within the staff of UNRWA, it’s 23%. A greater percentage of UN employees in Gaza are Hamas-affiliated than the general populace of Gaza!
NOW is the time to radically restructure UNRWA to stop the ongoing radicalization of Palestinian society. Why? Because Palestinians deserve better than UNRWA.
Help us meet this moment. Sign our petition to STOP FUNDING UNRWA until and unless the agency is radically reformed and restructured.
What happens when well-meaning Western donors feed money to a UN agency that turns a blind eye to terrorism? The numbers tell the story.
On October 7th:
- 133 UNRWA school graduates invaded Israel to murder and kidnap Israeli civilians,
- 12 UNRWA staff directly participated in the massacre,
- 2 UNRWA teachers held hostages captive in their own homes,
- 30 UNRWA teachers publicly celebrated the violence on social media, while
- 1,200 UNRWA staff quietly helped Hamas with cars, weapons, money, information, and hideouts.
In the wake of these damning revelations, 14 donor countries, led by the United States, have paused their funding to UNRWA, demanding an investigation. It’s a good first step, but this call for an “investigation” could be an invitation to sweep UNRWA’s problems under the rug. Fire a few people, blame the “few bad apples,” rename a few departments, and turn the money spigot back on. Why? Because “UNRWA is the only option.”
UNRWA is the only option because Hamas made it that way. UNRWA developed a monopoly on aid delivery in Gaza because it is the only aid agency in the world that has been willing to play by Hamas’ rules, which are: see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.
- When Hamas puts its members on the payroll, UNRWA allows it because Hamas isn’t recognized as a terrorist group by the UN!
- When Hamas stores rockets, grenades, and suicide belts inside UN schools, shelters, and clinics, UNRWA pretends not to see.
- When Hamas fighters jump onto aid trucks to steal their contents, UNRWA claims they’re just providing security.
You understand the problem now. You see that we can’t waste this moment. Now is the time to radically restructure UNRWA to stop the ongoing radicalization of Palestinian society.
Why? Because Palestinians deserve better than UNRWA. They deserve food, medicine, and shelter delivered by transparent organizations that are not routinely infiltrated by terrorists. They deserve to receive humanitarian aid and not see most of it stolen by Hamas. They deserve schools that promote coexistence with Jews and other minorities in the Middle East.
Help us meet this moment. Sign our petition to STOP FUNDING UNRWA until and unless the agency is radically reformed and restructured.
Click the button below if you wish to support our ongoing efforts.
Boycotting UN Investigations
The Only Productive Boycott for Israel
In relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the UN routinely conducts investigations and releases corresponding reports. These reports, which claim to offer an overview of the situation, are often prejudiced and fail to give equal weight to the merits of each side.
After the 11-day conflict between Israel and Hamas in 2021, the Geneva–based United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) created a three-person commission, to be headed by Navanethem “Navi” Pillay. Exceptionally, the most recent investigative body has taken a scope which extends beyond the 2021 conflict, urging Israel to take actions to solve the greater Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Pillay’s multiple associations with supporters of BDS, as well as the UN’s disproportionate historical focus on Israel through constant condemnation, further take away from the report’s legitimacy. The report has rightfully been criticized as one-sided, though the Israeli Government’s decision to not cooperate with the commission will further complicate Israel’s relations with the UN as a whole, even on issues with which Israel and the UN agree on. Additionally, it will be manipulated by international critics as purported proof of Israel attempting to hide damaging information.
Despite the consequences associated with any decision to not cooperate with the UN, Israel should refuse to cooperate with investigations of this type. It should do this to take a stand against investigations made in bad faith and avoid legitimizing reports whose unfavorable findings could be easily predicted when taking the international bodies and commission which made the report into account.
The United Nations’ disproportionate focus on Israel has been documented, with a majority of resolutions criticizing the country, despite it containing a fraction of a percentage of the world’s population and land area.[1] Putting aside the attention that could be given to more rights-abusive countries, the UNHRC itself seats members such as China, Cuba, Pakistan and Venezuela, who are engaged in severe repression and human rights violations.
The report further weighs in on the sources of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a whole and identifies Israeli actions as the main cause. This large-scale conclusion goes beyond the usual confines of UN investigations and demonstrates the pre-existing beliefs about the nature of the conflict which the investigation sought to prove. Furthermore, the commission’s brief mentions of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas’s human rights abuses fail to meaningfully place liability on both sides in the conflict or include the threats which Israel faces. Through tone and relative content, the report emphasizes critiques of Israel above all else.
Navi Pillay’s history regarding Israel is ambiguous at best. Pillay, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, signed a letter to US President Joe Biden calling on Israel to withdraw entirely from the West Bank shortly before she was appointed head of the commission.[2] She further stated that “Apartheid is now being declared a crime against humanity in the Rome Statute and it means the enforced segregation of people on racial lines and that is happening in Israel.”[3]
While this does not provide any concrete blame of Israel for the violence in 2021, it should come as little surprise that Pillay later stated that "[the report] is as an indicator of the asymmetrical nature of the conflict and the reality of one state occupying the other."[4] Pillay’s colleagues, Miloon Khotari and Chris Sidoti, have similarly clear pre-existing notions about Israel. Khotari, has referred to the Second Intifada as simply a “wave of Palestinian resistance,” described Israel’s government as a theocracy and openly called for an end to military cooperation with Israel.
Similarly, Sidoti has worked with pro-BDS organizations such as the Australian Center for International Justice and the Independent Commission for Human Rights, established by Yasser Arafat himself in 1993.[5] These appointments greatly diminished the legitimacy of the commission from the beginning, and the backgrounds of its members and the UN bodies which created it give the appearance that the investigation was never a major factor behind the tone and substance of the report.
The COI investigation’s boundaries make cooperation disadvantageous, as its scope and mandate both ensure abnormal treatment. The investigation can include events going all the way back to the founding of Israel, and this COI will continue indefinitely, with more reports to follow each year even after the current report’s release. The wide scope and continuous nature demonstrate the UN’s obsession with condemning Israel, as no other COI has ever been given this kind of never-ending mandate.
Israel could cooperate with proceedings and argue that it has nothing to hide, though doing this would not lessen international blame on Israel and it would continue to be subject to both double standards and disproportionate emphasis by the UNHRC and by the international community at large. Instead, the cooperation would be taken as simply a prerequisite for the investigation itself, and there would be a report written in a similarly one-sided manner.
The significance of negative reports could prove damaging to Israel’s reputation amongst some, though importantly, these reports will continue to be released with or without Israel’s cooperation. Boycotting will allow Israel to take an active stance in fighting a report which Israel feels is unfair, as opposed to letting the UN villainize Israel and only voicing disagreement after it is done.
While some might argue that refusing to cooperate with an investigation will isolate Israel from allies and the international community as a whole, Israel’s allies understand this. The commitment between them and Israel to their alliances will remain in all likelihood no matter what conclusions the UNHRC might reach from its numerous investigations, as they have for decades. Because of this, Israel has limited benefits to cooperating with the UN on this issue and little downside for refusing to do so.
Israel should not and does not deny that many Palestinians have a poor quality of life for a variety of reasons, and accordingly has investigated reported incidents based off of investigations such as the Goldstone reports, even without cooperating during the reports’ productions.[6] In this way, while the decision to boycott the investigation does not solve the underlying problem of discrimination against Israel and can give off an appearance of concealing evidence, Israel has the standing and experience to make this decision given the nature of the investigation.
By Ethan Kanef, intern at JIJ
[1] Becker, R.N., Hillman, A.L., Potrafke, N. et al. The preoccupation of the United Nations with Israel: Evidence and theory. Rev Int Organ 10, 413–437 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11558-014-9207-3
[2] #NowistheTime. June 14, 2021, https://nowisthetimecoalition.com/.
[3] “Navi Pillay on Israel Being an Apartheid State: Short Version.” Www.youtube.com, 29 Jan. 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sIEfCf1Dhs. Accessed 12 July 2022.
[4] “Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Including East Jerusalem, and Israel, Issues First Report.” The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, June 7, 2022. https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/06/commission-inquiry-occupied-palestinian-territory-including-east-jerusalem
[5] Bayefsky, Prof Anne. “The Newest Anti-Israel UN Action Must Be Challenged – Now.” Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, jcpa.org/article/the-newest-anti-israel-un-action-must-be-challenged-now/. Accessed 11 July 2022.
[6] Goldstone, Richard. “Reconsidering the Goldstone Report on Israel and War Crimes.” The Washington Post. WP Company, April 1, 2011.
4 times too much
The U.N. faces the largest refugee crisis in its history. Sixty-eight million people need help. Why, then, does the U.N. give four times as much aid, annually, to each Palestinian refugee as it gives to refugees anywhere else in the world?
Here is another question.
Why does UNRWA, the agency that handles five million Palestinians, employ 30,000 people while the World Refugee Agency (UNHCR), which serves sixty-three million refugees, employs 10,000 people?
The answers: politics. And politics.
To make matters even worse, the two agencies duplicate efforts in the same regions. UNRWA clinics refuse to treat Syrian or Lebanese refugees, but will only treat Palestinians. So, UNHCR must maintain redundant clinics in the same places, while the desperate health needs of refugees in other world regions take the hit.
Ron Prosor, former Israeli ambassador to the U.N. and currently the head of the Abba Eban Institute for Diplomacy, will shortly present the U.N. a plan to consolidate the resources of both agencies. What could possibly prevent the long-overdue adoption of such a common-sense proposal?
Nothing but politics as practiced within the as-if world of UNRWA whose work, unlike UNHCR, expects and requires the number of Palestinian refugees to “expand without limit”.
How can such a political miracle take place?
Conveniently, it turns out that Palestinian refugees aren’t really refugees at all and never have been.
Refugees, by definition, are refugees from somewhere. Palestinians are not, as you may imagine, refugees from Israel because they would then be eligible to apply for asylum in countries like Egypt, Syria and Jordan. But those countries have refused to accept and resettle Palestinians within their own lands for more than seven decades, blaming Israel for their own hostility.
Nor, however, can Palestinians return, legally, to Israel. They are not refugees from that land. Besides, U.N. statutes stipulated Israel’s own sovereignty, which she confirmed by a heroic war of Independence, and completed by generous assimilation of mistreated Jewish refugees.
Until the Orwellian treatment of Palestinians ends, normalization of relations between them, Israel and even other Arab nations is impossible. Not Israel, but rather fellow-Arabs and a complicit UNRWA trap the Palestinian people within impossible legal and political contradictions.
Prosor’s plan will end the UNRWA fantasy. Unfortunately, this makes it all too likely that the consolidation of UNRWA and UNHCR will fail to pass muster at today’s United Fantasyland, a.k.a. the United Nations.
Financing the Suffering of the Palestinians
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5YPCenFVS0
United Nations employs two groups to help refugees. One group helps refugees settle, while the other keeps them in limbo for generations. Watch this video to see how this contradiction developed and how we can help Palestinians escape decades of poverty in refugee camps.
UNRWA vs. UNHCR
This fact sheet compares the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
Download
NGOs in Human Rights Monitoring
This report examines the different actors involved in the UN human rights monitoring system, specifically treaty bodies and civil society actors. It also surveys in detail the role of NGOs as civil society actors reporting to UN bodies and then highlights human rights issues identified during the course an internship at the Jerusalem Institute of Justice.
Download
Reassesing UNRWA
This report analyzes the contrasting histories and track records of UNRWA and UNHCR. UNRWA’s original mission has been fatally compromised by a combination of systemic corruption and intervention into the internal political affairs of host countries. Most recently, this has included growing acquiescence, if not outright support, of ideological hostility to Israel and regional terrorism. By comparison, UNHCR remains faithful to its original mission, demonstrating a track record of substantive assistance to refugee communities. Therefore, we recommend the dissolution of UNRWA by its absorption, where useful, into UNHCR.