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UNRWA in Gaza Has Been Replaced; It’s Time to Shutter the Agency
Palestinians pass by the gate of an UNRWA-run school in Nablus in the West Bank. Photo: Reuters/Abed Omar Qusini.
The UN Relief and Works Agency — or UNRWA — in Gaza has been replaced by over a dozen other aid organizations. UNRWA’s decades-long monopoly on aid and services has finally been broken, presenting a rare opportunity for deradicalization and, eventually, peace.
What’s more, the international community now has a model for how to replace UNRWA everywhere it operates, not just in Gaza.
The UN Security Council approved President Donald Trump’s proposal to build a “Board of Peace” on November 17 that will oversee the deradicalization of Gaza and the dismantlement of Hamas’ terror state. But Trump’s vision will not succeed until UNRWA is shuttered.
UNRWA was created with a temporary mandate after Israel’s 1947-1948 War of Independence to provide aid and services to approximately 750,000 Palestinian Arabs displaced by the war.
Over the past 75 years, UNRWA’s mandate has ballooned. Not only does UNRWA continue to provide a myriad of services in the jurisdictions where Arab refugees from 1948 immigrated, but refugee status has been passed from generation to generation. As a result, what was a relatively small refugee population in 1948 (compared to other 20th century refugee populations) is today a large and growing 21st century refugee population with no end in sight. UNRWA counts 5.9 million Palestinian refugees and has an annual budget of over a billion and half dollars.
UNRWA schools teach the belief that Palestinian refugees and their millions of descendants would all return to the modern state of Israel — an outcome that would immediately erase Israel’s Jewish majority.
The focus on “return,” coupled with the well-documented glorification of terror and incitement — including arithmetic problems involving numbers of Palestinian “martyrs,” antisemitic tropes, and naming schools and soccer fields after suicide bombers — has produced generations of indoctrinated and radicalized Palestinian children.
UNRWA staff participated in the horrors of October 7, praised the violence on social media, and Israeli hostages were held captive in UNRWA facilities for months during the war.
Once Israel exposed the extent of UNRWA’s involvement in terror, Israel’s Knesset passed legislation in October 2024 to end coordination with UNRWA and to rescind the special privileges and immunities that Israel granted the organization. Israel’s actions made it difficult for UNRWA — which had used the Jewish State as its base of operations for decades — to continue delivering its services.
UNRWA advocates warned that Israel’s new law would have catastrophic consequences. It didn’t.
Israel’s justified decision to cease cooperating with UNRWA demonstrated quickly that other organizations and state actors — without the proclivity towards terror — were willing and able to step in.
UNRWA candidly describes itself as a quasi-state actor. This is true. For decades, UNRWA in Gaza provided services — like trash collection, education, and health clinics — that should be the responsibility of the state. In Gaza, this meant that Hamas outsourced its governmental obligations to UNRWA — with the international community picking up the bill — financially freeing Hamas terrorists to hoard weapons and build a terror fortress underneath Gaza.
Before October 7, UNRWA was the second biggest employer in Gaza and provided basic services like sanitation, health, and education to over a million people. After Hamas launched the war, UNRWA — swiftly announcing that it was not the terror organization’s responsibility to care for distressed Gazan civilians — went into high gear, taking over additional aid distribution functions.
In January 2025, when Trump negotiated the first ceasefire between Israel and Gaza, the UN established a new initiative with a dedicated online tracker to monitor aid entering Gaza. The tracker reports that UNRWA has not brought any aid into Gaza since January.
According to an Israeli official familiar with aid delivery in Gaza, the basic services performed by UNRWA before and during the first year of the war are now performed by other actors in the enclave. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is managing most of the waste management in the enclave. Fuel distribution is managed by the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS). The World Central Kitchen has been effective at delivering food alongside the World Food Program (WFP), which is also handling the broader logistics function for aid delivery in Gaza — a function WFP performs worldwide. UNICEF has taken a larger role in children-related humanitarian responses, and the World Health Organization (WHO) is providing medical aid to field clinics and hospitals.
This is how the rest of the world manages humanitarian crises caused by wars and natural disasters, and the correct way to manage the crisis in Gaza: with organizations that have a temporary mandate to deliver aid. Once the crisis has passed, those services should once again be the responsibility of the state.
Funding UNRWA — a self-described quasi-state — for over three quarters of a century to run services that should be the responsibility of a state government has been a calamity for Gaza and the region.
US taxpayers have historically been UNRWA’s largest donor, and have contributed over seven billion dollars to the UN agency since its creation. Congress has voiced consistent but limited support for ending UNRWA funding, and both Presidents Trump and Biden previously cut taxpayer dollars to the UN agency.
UNRWA supporters — including UNRWA’s US organization that lobbies Washington for support and funding — railed against attempts to cut funding, arguing that “UNRWA is irreplaceable,” a slogan often employed by UNRWA staff and advocates.
The reality is that UNRWA in Gaza has already been replaced.
Sadly, UNRWA’s multi-generation radicalization campaign in Gaza is not unique. The same brainwashing is happening wherever UNRWA operates, breeding terrorists and terror sympathizers across the region.
The UN and the international community can use the Gaza model to replace UNRWA’s corrosive monopoly on aid to Palestinians across the region.
The Trump administration now has an opportunity to wield its influence with other major UNRWA donors — namely the EU, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Canada, and Japan — to redirect their UNRWA funding to relief organizations that can deliver the much-needed aid and services without the radicalizing agenda. This critical reform should be implemented if the world truly wants to bring about peace.
Enia Krivine is the senior director of the Israel Program and the National Security Network at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Follow her on X @EKrivine.
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Israel Publishes Draft Law Seeking to Boost State Revenues From Dead Sea Minerals
A drone picture shows part of the Dead Sea and its shore near Ein Gedi, Israel, Feb. 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ilan Rosenberg
Israel on Wednesday published a draft law that aims to boost state revenues from a concession for extracting minerals from the Dead Sea as well as tackling its environmental consequences.
The Finance Ministry said the proposed law intends to redefine the concession to ensure the public and the state get their rightful share, while ensuring the preservation of nature and environmental values.
“The law serves as the basis for allocating the concession and the terms of the future tender for resource extraction from the Dead Sea, with an emphasis on promoting optimal competition, lowering entry barriers, and attracting leading international players,” it said.
Fertilizer maker ICL Group has held the concession, giving it exclusive rights to minerals from the Dead Sea site, for five decades, but its permit is set to expire in 2030.
Last month, ICL gave up right of first refusal for its Dead Sea concession under a government plan to open it up for tender, although it would receive some $3 billion if it loses the permit when it expires.
ICL, one of the world’s largest potash producers, has previously said its Dead Sea assets were worth $6 billion. ICL extracts mainly potash and magnesium from the concession.
Under the draft law, which still needs preliminary approval from lawmakers, the state‘s share of concession profits would ultimately rise to an average of 50% from 35% currently, partly through royalties, the ministry said.
The law also aims to tackle negative impacts of resource extraction activities in the Dead Sea, which continues to shrink.
ICL plans to participate in the future tender and has said it believes it is the most suitable candidate to operate the future concession.
Accountant General Yali Rothenberg said the law places emphasis on fair, efficient, and responsible use of one of Israel’s most important natural resources.
It “will ensure that the state maximizes economic value for the public, promotes optimal competition, and protects the unique environment of the Dead Sea region for future generations,” he said.
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Israel Says It Received Body From Hamas, Indicates Rafah Crossing to Open Soon to Let Gazans Cross Into Egypt
People hold images of dead hostages Ran Gvili and Sudthisak Rinthalak, whose bodies haven’t been returned yet, as Israelis attend a rally calling for the immediate return of the remains of all hostages held in Gaza, more than two years after the deadly Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas, at the Hostages Square in Tel Aviv, Israel, Nov. 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Nir Elias
Israel received a body that the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas said was one of the last two deceased hostages in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, as Israel said it would allow Gaza’s gateway to Egypt to open once all hostages were returned.
A body has been transferred by the Red Cross to the Israeli military and will undergo forensic identification, a statement from the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office said.
Hamas also handed over remains on Tuesday, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office later said were not of any hostage.
The handover of the last hostages’ bodies in Gaza would complete a key condition of the initial part of US President Donald Trump’s plan to end the two-year Gaza war, which also provides for the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt to open in both directions.
Israel has kept the crossing shut since the ceasefire came into effect in October, saying that Hamas must abide by the agreement to return all hostages still in Gaza, living and deceased.
“The crossing will be opened both ways when all of our hostages have been returned,” Israeli government spokesperson Shosh Bedrosian told reporters.
Since the fragile truce started, Hamas has returned all 20 living hostages and 26 bodies in exchange for around 2,000 Palestinian detainees and convicted prisoners, but two more deceased captives – an Israeli police officer and a Thai agricultural worker – are still in Gaza.
ISRAEL SAYS PREVIOUS ‘FINDINGS’ NOT LINKED TO HOSTAGES
The armed wing of the Hamas-allied Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist group, the Al Quds Brigades, said it had found a hostage body after conducting a search in northern Gaza, along with a team from the Red Cross.
Hamas and Islamic Jihad said they had handed over the body to the Red Cross late on Wednesday afternoon. The groups did not say which of the two remaining deceased hostages they believed it to be.
The two are Israeli police officer Ran Gvili and Thai national Sudthisak Rinthalak, both kidnapped during Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel that triggered two years of devastating war in Gaza.
OPENING OF CROSSING COULD ALLOW OUT THOSE NEEDING TREATMENT
COGAT, the Israeli military arm that oversees humanitarian matters, said the Rafah crossing would be opened in the coming days to allow Palestinians to cross into Egypt.
The decision to open the crossing for those seeking to leave Gaza was made in “full coordination” with those that have mediated between Israel and Hamas during the war, Bedrosian said.
Egypt, along with Qatar and the US, has acted as a mediator.
COGAT said it would be opened under the supervision of a European Union mission – a similar mechanism to that employed during a previous Gaza ceasefire agreed in January 2025.
Before the war, the Rafah crossing was a key entry point for aid into the territory, as well as weapons smuggling for Hamas. It has been mostly closed throughout the conflict.
At least 16,500 patients in Gaza require medical care outside of the enclave, according to the United Nations. Some Gazans have managed to leave for medical treatment abroad through Israel.
Violence has tailed off since the Oct. 10 ceasefire but Israel has continued to strike Gaza and conduct demolitions against what it says is Hamas infrastructure. Hamas and Israel have traded blame for violating the US-backed agreement.
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Israel, Lebanon Send Civilian Envoys to Truce Committee for First Direct Talks in Decades
An Israeli citizen looks out from a viewpoint towards Lebanon, near the Israel-Lebanon border, as seen from northern Israel, Nov. 24, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Shir Torem
Israel and Lebanon sent civilian envoys to a military committee monitoring their ceasefire, top officials from both said on Wednesday, in a move set to expand the scope of talks between the long-time foes for the first time.
The meeting was a step toward a months-old US demand that the two countries broaden talks beyond monitoring the 2024 ceasefire, in line with US President Donald Trump’s agenda of peace agreements across the Middle East.
It came even as fears of a renewed flare-up between Israel and powerful Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah persist.
Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam told journalists he hoped civilian participation in the meetings would help “defuse tensions,” saying further Israeli strikes in recent weeks had been a clear escalatory signal.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the atmosphere at the meeting was good and that the sides agreed to put forth ideas for economic cooperation.
LEBANON OPEN TO US, FRENCH TROOPS
Lebanon and Israel have been officially enemy states for over 70 years, and Beirut criminalizes contacts with Israeli nationals. Meetings between civilian officials of each side have been extraordinarily rare throughout their fraught history.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun has said in recent months, however, that he is open to negotiations to pursue a more robust truce and dispatched Lebanon‘s former ambassador to Washington, Simon Karam, to head his country’s delegation to the truce committee‘s meeting.
Netanyahu’s office said that it had sent the deputy head of foreign policy division at Israel‘s National Security Council to the meeting, as part of what it said was the ongoing dialogue between Israel, Lebanon, and the United States.
The committee, chaired by the United States, met on Wednesday for approximately three hours on the Blue Line, which serves as the frontier between Lebanon and Israel.
A statement issued after the session concluded said attendees welcomed the added envoys as an “important step” toward ensuring the committee is “anchored in lasting civilian as well as military dialogue.”
It said it looked forward to working with the representatives to nurture peace along the long-volatile border.
Israel and Lebanon agreed to a US-brokered ceasefire in 2024 that ended more than a year of fighting between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah. Since then, they have traded accusations over violations.
Salam said on Wednesday Lebanon was open to the committee taking on a direct verification role to check Israeli claims that Hezbollah is re-arming, and verify the work of the Lebanese army in dismantling the terrorist group’s infrastructure.
Asked by reporters if that meant Beirut was willing to have French and US troops on the ground, Salam said, “Of course.”
ISRAEL DEMANDS HEZBOLLAH DISARM
Netanyahu’s office said that regardless of any economic cooperation, Hezbollah must be disarmed.
Hezbollah’s media office did not immediately respond to questions from Reuters on the talks‘ expansion.
The Iranian-backed, Shi’ite Muslim group has repeatedly rejected any negotiations with Israel as a “trap.”
Despite the ceasefire, Israel has continued air strikes on what it says are Hezbollah’s efforts to rebuild its military capabilities in breach of the truce. Lebanon says Israel‘s bombardment and occupation of hilltop positions in south Lebanon amount to ceasefire breaches.
Fears have been growing in Lebanon that Israel will return to a full-blown military campaign after expressing frustration with the pace of Lebanese authorities’ efforts to seize Hezbollah weaponry across the country.