Anti-UNRWA funding agreement on track to become law: NYT
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The ban on funding is expected until March 2025 with familiar sources citing that the discussions included efforts to impose a longer-term financing freeze.
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People walk past the damaged Gaza City headquarters of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) on February 15, 2024. (AFP)
The United States would decrease money for UNRWA as part of a budget agreement that is expected to become law soon, sources familiar reported to The New York Times.
The ban, which is part of a major budget plan negotiated by legislators and the White House and anticipated to pass Congress this weekend, would result in a deficit of hundreds of millions of dollars for UNRWA.
UNRWA offers educational, healthcare, and humanitarian assistance to approximately 5.7 million registered Palestinian refugees across the Middle East. The United States, "Israel's" staunch ally and its main backer in the genocide in Gaza, has been the largest contributor to UNRWA's $1.4 billion annual budget.
The decision would also further put Washington at odds with its Western partners over how to deal with the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.
The ban on funding is expected until March 2025 with familiar sources citing that the discussions included efforts to impose a longer-term financing freeze.
The ban is likely to move smoothly through Congress.
Canada, Spain, and Sweden recently announced they will resume funding for the United Nations Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) more than a month after suspending it in line with about 15 other countries, following unverified Israeli claims about a dozen UNRWA employees allegedly taking part in the Palestinian Resistance's operation on October 7.
Reuters: 'Israel' coerced UNRWA employees to admit ties to Hamas
Following weeks of a nonstop Israeli targeted campaign against the UN agency, UNRWA said in an unpublished report that some of its staffers were coerced into falsely stating that they had ties with the Palestinian Resistance movement - Hamas - and that they took part in Operation Al-Aqsa Flood on October 7 last year, Reuters reported on Saturday.
The occupation entity alleged in January that 12 of the 12,000 UNRWA members in Gaza participated in the October operation.
According to the news agency, UNRWA's report dated February said that its workers were subjected "to threats and coercion" by the Israeli authorities "while in detention and pressured to make false statements against the Agency," including that it has affiliations with Hamas and that "UNRWA staff members took part" in the Resistance operation in October 2023.
Juliette Touma, the communications director for UNRWA, stated that the agency intended to provide the information contained in the report to organizations both within and outside the UN, who are specialized in documenting potential human rights violations.
"When the war comes to an end there needs to be a series of inquiries to look into all violations of human rights," Touma said.
The UNRWA report said that the agency's staffers were subjected to waterboarding, beatings, dog attacks, and sexual violence, in addition to the death of some detainees under interrogation after being denied medical care.
Meanwhile, Phillipe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA, has reiterated that "Israel" provided no evidence against the accused agency employees, pointing out that it was "a deliberate and concerted campaign" to end the agency and its work.
In an attempt to get operations running again, UNRWA fired the staff members accused by "Israel" to maintain the agency's ability to facilitate and deliver humanitarian assistance to Gaza. An independent internal UN probe was later launched as well.
