The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) announced Friday that it would launch an investigation into information provided by Israeli authorities regarding the alleged involvement of several of the agency’s employees in Hamas’ terrorist attack on Israel on October 7, which resulted in the deaths of over 1,200 Israelis.
“The Israeli Authorities have provided UNRWA with information about the alleged involvement of several UNRWA employees in the horrific attacks on Israel on 7 October,” Philippe Lazzarini, the UNRWA’s commissioner-general said in a statement. “To protect the Agency’s ability to deliver humanitarian assistance, I have taken the decision to immediately terminate the contracts of these staff members and launch an investigation in order to establish the truth without delay. Any UNRWA employee who was involved in acts of terror will be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution.”
The State Department also issued a statement Friday announcing that it would pause additional funding for the agency due to the allegations. The department’s statement noted that 12 UNRWA employees so far have been accused of involvement in Hamas’ attack.
“The United States is extremely troubled by the allegations that twelve UNRWA employees may have been involved in the October 7 Hamas terrorist attack on Israel. The Department of State has temporarily paused additional funding for UNRWA while we review these allegations and the steps the United Nations is taking to address them,” the statement from department spokesperson Matthew Miller said.
The UNRWA has a well-documented history of anti-Israel bias.
UNRWA facilitates the spreading of anti-Semitic propaganda via many avenues, the most troublesome of which is perhaps its production of educational materials for children inciting hatred of Jews. Other examples include Nazi-like cartoons shared on social media by its staff and promoting terrorist-supporting flotillas and violence against Israel. UNRWA has also allowed Hamas to use its facilities and has employed its members as staff.
Hillel Neuer, the Executive Director of UN Watch, told a congressional hearing back in November that “Teachers and schools at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which runs education and social services for Palestinians, regularly call to murder Jews, and create teaching materials that glorify terrorism, encourage martyrdom, demonize Israelis and incite antisemitism.”
“In 2022 alone, UNRWA received $344 million in U.S. funding,” Neuer continued. “Yet a March 2023 report by UN Watch and Impact-SE identified 133 UNRWA educators and staff who were found to promote hate and violence on social media, and an additional 82 teachers and other staff affiliated with 30 UNRWA schools who were involved in drafting and distributing hateful content to students.”
CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILYWIRE+ APP
Neuer previously pointed out in 2017 that the agency had attempted to pass off a picture of a little girl standing amid rubble in war-torn Syria in 2015 as a girl living in the Gaza Strip.
“Left: UNRWA photo, Jan. 27. 2015, of girl in Syria Right: Same UNRWA photo, May 29, 2017, but now she’s “Aya from Gaza” oppressed by Israel,” he posted on Twitter.
“No organization exemplifies the UN’s nurturing of Palestinian grievances at the expense of Palestinians better than UNRWA,” Jonathan Schanzer, the Senior Vice President for Research at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, said during the same hearing in November.
“The agency has over 30,000 employees. UNRWA doesn’t screen them for ties to terrorist groups, meaning that many employees are members of or affiliated with Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, or other violent groups,” Schanzer pointed out.
The House Foreign Affairs Committee had already scheduled a hearing for Tuesday to examine UNRWA’s links to Hamas terrorists as well as the attack on Oct. 7, according to Jewish Insider.