Philippe Lazzarini, head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), visited Ireland this week following the nation’s determination to pledge 20 million euros (just below $21.5m) in help for the crisis-hit company.
The UNRWA, which offers healthcare, schooling and different very important providers to the Palestinian individuals, was accused by Israel final month of getting hyperlinks to the Hamas assault on southern Israel on October 7, prompting greater than 10 donor nations, together with the United States, Germany, the European Union and Canada, to droop monetary help.
The funding from these nations makes up the majority of all funding obtained by the UNRWA. Being lower off on this approach means the company will run out of cash altogether inside weeks, it mentioned.
Ireland is likely one of the few nations to carry agency, nevertheless. “In Gaza, we are bearing witness to a humanitarian catastrophe,” mentioned Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin on Thursday. “People are in dire need of the most basic life-saving provisions – food, water, shelter. In these most harrowing conditions, facing the prospect of further military escalation, UNRWA is the backbone of the humanitarian response. It urgently needs support from all UN member states.”
Why is the UNRWA so vital?
The UNRWA was established in 1949 within the wake of the creation of the State of Israel.
Indeed, between November 29, 1947, when the UN General Assembly voted to partition the fading British Mandate of Palestine into one Jewish and one Arab state, and the institution of Israel itself on May 14 the next yr, armed fighters had ethnically cleansed 1000’s of Palestinians from their properties.
This clearance of Palestinians from their properties and land continued even after armies from surrounding Arab nations invaded Israel on May 15, 1948 and by the primary half of 1949, at the least 750,000 Palestinians in complete had been forcibly expelled or had fled from their homeland.
From the ashes of what Palestinians nonetheless seek advice from because the Nakba (the “catastrophe”) was born the UNRWA, which operates not solely within the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, but additionally in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria the place Palestinian refugees right now quantity within the tens of millions.
How a lot of a shortfall in funding is the UNRWA dealing with and why?
Israel, which has killed almost 30,000 Palestinians within the Hamas-run Gaza Strip because it started shelling the impoverished enclave on October 7 final yr, alleges that 12 UNRWA employees from the physique’s 13,000 staff in Gaza had been concerned within the Hamas assault on Israel, which killed 1,139 Israelis.
Israel’s allegations, compiled in a six-page file, had been sufficient for the likes of the US, Germany and the EU to pause their contributions to the UNRWA which, in 2022, had been value $343.9m, $202.1m and $114.2m respectively.
The UNRWA estimates that donor suspensions will depart it with a $440m funding shortfall.
Which nations have suspended funding?
As the highest three funders to the UNWRA’s $1.17bn finances in 2022, the choice by the US, Germany and the EU to droop donations has come as a bitter blow to the almost 75-year-old UN physique.
Ilan Pappé, creator of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, issued a withering criticism of these nations selecting to droop funding, telling Al Jazeera that this was “the Global North following blindly here the Israeli cue on UNRWA”.
The full listing of nations to have suspended funding to UNRWA is as follows:
- Australia
- Austria
- Canada
- Estonia
- Finland
- Germany
- Iceland
- Italy
- Japan
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- The Netherlands
- New Zealand
- Romania
- Sweden
- Switzerland
- United Kingdom
- United States
Which nations are persevering with to help the UNRWA?
Countries together with Belgium, Norway, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Turkey and, in fact, Ireland, have determined to proceed supporting the UNRWA.
On February 1, the Belgian deputy prime minister, Petra De Sutter, whose nation offered the UNRWA with $12.6m in 2022, posted on X: “Belgium will continue to fund UNRWA. The agency is irreplaceable in providing urgent and crucial humanitarian relief within Gaza.”
Speaking at Tuesday’s World Governments Summit in Dubai, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose nation funded the UN physique to the tune of $25.2m in 2022, mentioned: “It hurts us to see the attacks against the staff of the UN Palestinian agency and we must extend our support.”
The day earlier than Lazzarini secured funding for the UNRWA from the Irish authorities, the nation’s prime minister, Leo Varadkar, summed up the sentiments of his authorities in direction of Israel’s struggle on Gaza.
“It’s very, very clear to me … that Israel is not listening to any country in the world, I don’t even think they’re listening to the Americans anymore,” he informed the Irish parliament on Tuesday. “They have become blinded by rage.”
Why does Ireland really feel an affinity for the Palestinian individuals?
The historic Irish wrestle to free itself from the yoke of British domination is one purpose why many within the Republic of Ireland really feel a powerful affinity with Palestine, which, as Israel’s brutal struggle on Gaza illustrates, has suffered underneath Israeli occupation for generations.
The Irish Free State, which Northern Ireland opted to not be a part of, was established in 1922 after a number of years of battle between Irish nationalists and the British authorities, with the nation formally turning into a republic 27 years later.
In 1980, Ireland turned the primary member of the European Community (now the EU) to endorse Palestinian statehood and the nation’s help resonates to at the present time.
Indeed, within the early weeks of Israel’s persevering with struggle on Gaza, when nations within the West had been dashing to help Israel’s “right to self-defence” within the wake of the Hamas assault, Varadkar supplied a extra nuanced view.
“What I’m seeing unfolding at the moment isn’t just self-defence,” mentioned the Irish prime minister in November final yr. “It looks, resembles, something more approaching revenge. That’s not where we should be. And I don’t think that’s how Israel will guarantee future freedom and future security.”
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