Israel cuts ties with UN agency for Palestinian refugees

The agency, UNRWA, is banned from operating in Israel, and contact between it and Israeli officials will also be forbidden.

UNRWA has provided support for Palestinian refugees around the Middle East for more than 70 years, but has long clashed with Israeli officials, who have repeatedly accused it of undermining the country's security.

The hostility intensified following Hamas's October 7, 2023 surprise attack on Israel, with accusations that UNRWA employees took part in the assault.

After the law came into effect, the Norwegian government said Thursday it would contribute $24 million to the UN agency.

"Gaza is in ruins, and UNRWA's help is more necessary than ever," Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said.

Turkey condemned the Israeli move as "a blatant violation of international law" and said the step "marks a new phase in Israel's policies of occupation and annexation aimed at forcibly displacing Palestinians from their own land". 

'Infested' 

Israel defended the decision.

"Humanitarian aid doesn't equal UNRWA, and UNRWA doesn't equal humanitarian aid. UNRWA equals an organisation infested with Hamas terror activity," foreign ministry spokesman Oren Marmorstein wrote on X ahead of the ban.

"This is why, beginning on January 30 and in accordance with Israeli law, Israel will have no contact with UNRWA."

The agency’s offices and staff in Israel play a major role in the provision of healthcare and education to Palestinians, including those living in Gaza, which has been devastated by the war between Israel and Hamas.

Government spokesman David Mencer said on Wednesday that “UNRWA is riddled with Hamas operatives”, adding that “if a state funds UNRWA, that state is funding terrorists”.

“UNRWA employs over 1,200 Hamas members, including terrorists who carried out the October 7 massacre,” Mencer said. “This isn’t aid, it’s direct financial support for terror.”

Later on Wednesday, Israel’s supreme court rejected a petition by Palestinian human rights group Adalah contesting the UNRWA ban.

The court said the legislation “prohibits UNRWA activity only on the sovereign territory of the State of Israel”, but “does not prohibit such activity in the areas of Judea-Samaria and the Gaza Strip”, referring to the West Bank by its biblical name.

The ban does apply, however, to Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem, where UNRWA has a field headquarters for its operations in the West Bank.

‘Catastrophic’ 

In response, Adalah said the law would come into effect “disregarding the catastrophic humanitarian consequences”.

The move, which has been backed by Israel’s close ally the United States, has drawn condemnation from aid groups and US allies.

The agency says it has brought in 60 per cent of the food aid that has reached Gaza since the war started with Hamas’s 2023 attack on Israel.

Israeli envoy to the United Nations Danny Danon told the UN Security Council on Tuesday that UNRWA must cease its operations and evacuate all premises it operates in East Jerusalem on Thursday.

In response, UN chief Antonio Guterres demanded that Israel rescind its order.

“I regret this decision and request that the government of Israel retract it,” he said, stressing UNRWA was “irreplaceable”.

The agency’s chief, Philippe Lazzarini, said UNRWA’s capacity to distribute aid “far exceeds that of any other entity”.

He called Israel’s actions against UNRWA a “relentless assault... harming the lives and future of Palestinians across the occupied Palestinian territory”.

Israel alleges a dozen UNRWA employees were involved in the 2023 attack, and insists other agencies can step in to provide essential services, aid and reconstruction — something the UN and many donor governments dispute.

A series of investigations, including one led by former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna, found some “neutrality-related issues” at UNRWA, but stressed Israel had not provided evidence for its headline allegation.