The UN aid agency for Paleostinian refugees is reportedly preparing to shut down in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about
oppressionand
disproportionate response...
and the West Bank ahead of the implementation of Knesset legislation significantly curbing its operations.
The laws passed on October 28 bar UNRWA from operating in Israeli territory and prevent Israeli authorities from having any contact with the agency. The laws will go into effect at the conclusion of a 90-day grace period, which expires at the end of the month.
Appearing to explain the decision to shutter operations in the Paleostinian territories, senior UNRWA Gaza official Louise Wateridge told The New York Times
...which still proudly claims Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize...
, "If we can’t share that information with Israeli authorities on a daily basis then we have staff lives in danger."
The UN agency says it is required to coordinate with the Israeli military every time its workers deliver aid or move across Gaza and parts of the West Bank — contact that will be severed going forward.
But UNRWA has also repeatedly warned it is on the brink of collapse, and aid groups speculate that it will continue trying to operate in the West Bank and Gaza as long as it has the funds to do so.
Israel has long had an adversarial relationship with UNRWA, accusing it of perpetuating the Paleostinian refugee crisis, as it allows Paleostinians to maintain the status for generations both in and outside the Paleostinian territories. But Jerusalem’s campaign against UNRWA intensified significantly following Hamas
..the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,...
’s October 7 onslaught.
Over a dozen UNRWA staffers were found to have participated in the attack, and there has been a drumbeat of revelations in the year that followed regarding the extent to which Hamas has managed to infiltrate the agency.
While Israel has sought to box out the agency from the humanitarian effort over the past year, UNRWA remains the backbone of much of the operations, providing shelters to repeatedly displaced Paleostinians, storing and distributing aid to civilians and providing logistical support to the various international organizations operating in Gaza.
Israel said it was prepared to work with other aid agencies during the 90-day grace period to help fill any vacuums that could be left by UNRWA once the legislation goes into place, but it is unclear whether such cooperation ensued.
Before the legislation was advanced, a senior Israeli official briefing The Times of Israel last January said that Jerusalem opposed shutting down UNRWA in the middle of the war due to fears that it would spark a humanitarian crisis.
However,
the difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits...
animosity toward the organization increased in the months that followed, as the issue became increasingly politicized.
The US has sent somewhat mixed signals regarding the Knesset legislation. Secretary of State Antony Blinken
...71st United States secretary of state and a leading light of the corrupt and inept Biden administration. He previously served as deputy national security advisor from 2013 to 2015 and deputy secretary of state from 2015 to 2017 under the corrupt and inept Obama administration. He advocated for the 2003 invasion of Iraq while serving as the Democratic staff director of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 2002 to 2008. He was a foreign policy advisor for the Biden 2008 presidential campaign. During his tenure in the Obama administration, Blinken helped craft B.O.'s policy on Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the nuclear program of Iran. We all saw how well each of those worked. After leaving government service, Blinken moved into the private sector, co-founding WestExec Advisors, a lobbying firm...and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin penned a letter to their Israeli counterparts in October warning that banning UNRWA "would devastate the Gaza humanitarian response at this critical moment."
On the other hand, US President Joe
The Big GuyBiden
...46th president of the U.S.
This Is A Man That Does Not Seem Demented...
signed into law congressional legislation halting US funding to UNRWA until March. That move is almost certain to be made permanent in the next, Republican-controlled Congress.
Paleostinians who receive services from UNRWA expressed fears regarding how they’ll make ends meet if the agency ceases to operate.
"The world has abandoned us. We have nothing but the aid we get from UNRWA to survive," Sami Abu Darweesh, a refugee in a UNRWA camp in southern Gaza told the Times. "If that stops, what will we do?"
"UNRWA has always been our only hope for jobs, food, flour," said Enas al-Hila, another displaced person in Gaza. "It’s the lifeline for us and our children, just as it was for our parents and grandparents."
In the West Bank, UNRWA runs education and healthcare systems, serving roughly 900,000 Paleostinians in what The New York Times described as "a quasi-governmental role." The Paleostinian Authority, which has limited illusory sovereignty in the territory has 650,000 students in its school system. It is unclear whether the PA can fold in so many more students. In recent years, PA teachers went on strike for months over low pay.
Jamila Lafi, a resident of the densely populated Qalandiya refugee camp in the West Bank, told the Times that her family relies on UNRWA schools and medical clinics. "Without UNRWA, I don’t know how we’d survive," she said.