On Wednesday, the United Nations Security Council held another “special discussion” on UNRWA, the United Nations agency that oversees the Palestinian Authority “refugees.”
UNRWA representative Pierre Krähenbühl told the Security Council the organization needs an additional $1.2 billion for its activities in 2019.
“We don’t believe the future of Palestine refugees should be framed in decades of UNRWA,” he said. “They deserve a better political future. Until then, we will continue to operate.”
Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, maintained that it is time to bring an end to the Palestinian refugee issue in the region; something every other refugee agency does as part of its UN mandate.
“UNRWA has been empowering the refugee problem for years, instead of trying to solve it while adopting a unilateral political position. The organization’s schools have been transformed into terror and incitement infrastructures, with textbooks distributed on the ground denying Israel’s existence, and underground tunnels dug by Hamas,” the ambassador said.
“UNRWA failed to rehabilitate the Gaza Strip and succeeded only in inciting violence against the State of Israel. UNRWA’s mandate must come to an end,” Danon added, and then challenged the UNRWA representative, asking, “UNRWA, like any organization, must have clear goals. What are those goals? How long will it take to reach them? And how much will it cost?”
Ambassador Danon demanded that the Council members receive the representative’s answers within six months.
He also said it is in the best interest of the agency, Israel, the Middle East and Palestinian Authority citizens for the UN to “finally designate Hamas as a terrorist organization” and to “stop pumping money into an organization that has continued the plight of the Palestinian
people in Gaza.
“UNRWA has failed to rehabilitate the Gaza Strip. It has succeeded only in inciting violence against the State of Israel. UNRWA’s mandate must come to an end.”