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The UNRWA Meltdown
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
JNS.org – If anything illuminates the insanity and moral bankruptcy of our times, it’s the reaction to Israel’s decision to act against the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).
Laws passed this week by the Israeli Knesset, which will come into force in three months’ time, ban UNRWA from operating in either Israel or Gaza, prohibit state officials from having any contact with the agency or its representatives, and enable Israel to arrest and prosecute any of its employees with terrorist connections.
The evidence is overwhelming that UNRWA is indeed an active partner of Hamas.
Israel has claimed that dozens of UNRWA officials and staffers directly participated in last year’s Oct. 7 pogrom in southern Israel, when 1,200 were murdered and more than 250 kidnapped into Gaza.
Mohammad Abu Itiwi, who led the murder and kidnapping of Israelis hiding in a roadside bomb shelter on that terrible day, and who was killed by the Israel Defense Forces last week in Gaza, had been employed by UNRWA since July 2022 while serving as a Nukbha commander in Hamas’s Bureij Battalion.
Fateh Sherif Abu el-Amin, who led Hamas in Lebanon and was killed in an Israeli airstrike there in September, doubled as the head of Lebanon’s UNRWA teachers’ union. A school principal, he oversaw 65 schools and roughly 40,000 students. He had also been responsible for coordinating terror activities between Hamas and Hezbollah; procuring weapons and recruiting terrorists; and using social media to incite attacks.
The IDF repeatedly discovered terrorist infrastructure sited in and around UNRWA schools, hospitals and other facilities. Back in February, Israeli forces found below UNRWA’s headquarters in Gaza City a subterranean data center that was hooked up to the electricity supply in the UNRWA facility above.
According to the curricula monitoring organization IMPACT-se, UNRWA’s school curriculum has had a “central, radicalizing influence on generations of Palestinians” and teaches children that the Jews are liars and fraudsters” who “spread corruption.”
Despite all this and more such evidence of UNRWA’s terrorist ties, there has been hysterical outrage over Israel’s ban. There have been claims that it will deepen the humanitarian crisis with Gazans now on the brink of starvation—a claim that’s been made repeatedly during the war but has always proved untrue.
In reality, hundreds of aid trucks enter Gaza every week, but Hamas continues to steal the aid and sell it on the black market at hugely inflated prices that Gaza residents cannot afford. Hamas has seized an estimated $500 million in foreign aid since the war began.
Most of the assistance coming in isn’t even being distributed by UNRWA. Israeli officials have said that aid agencies such as the World Food Program, World Central Kitchen and UNICEF have a bigger role in distributing Gaza’s aid supplies.
None of this is acknowledged by those claiming that the Palestinian Arabs in Gaza are starving and UNRWA is irreplaceable. Other aid agencies, they say, don’t provide health and education services.
But UNRWA’s schools have taught generations of Gaza’s children to hate and murder Jews. According to the IDF, every single UNRWA hospital and clinic has been used as a terrorist hub, with clinical staff doubling as Hamas members.
In any civilized universe, how can such a provision be deemed “irreplaceable”? Shouldn’t the appropriate response to the organization that has facilitated such terrorist assistance be to shut it down?
Moreover, why should Israel be held responsible for providing Gaza with humanitarian assistance? Israel has been under bombardment from the coastal enclave for two decades. Gaza’s population elected Hamas to rule them. Opinion polling consistently reveals that even among those who now hate Hamas, the vast majority support the killing of Israelis.
Thousands of those civilians took part in the Oct. 7 atrocities in Israel and grossly abused the Israeli captives when they were dragged into Gaza. The IDF subsequently found evidence of ties to Hamas in virtually every house.
In what conceivable moral universe is a country targeted for such a remorseless and genocidal attack expected to look after the welfare of its murderous attackers?
The United Nations says that Jerusalem has an obligation under international law to provide humanitarian assistance in Gaza because Israel is the occupying power. But this is totally untrue. Israel is not occupying Gaza. It withdrew from it altogether in 2005.
It’s the United Nations that has failed to live up to its own international obligation not to fund and support violence. For years, the world body has turned a blind eye to UNRWA’s ties to terrorists. So have America, Britain and other countries. They still refuse to acknowledge this problem.
In a statement this week expressing “grave concern” over the Israeli ban, the foreign ministers of Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Japan, the Republic of Korea and the United Kingdom claimed that UNRWA was tackling its employees’ support for terrorism by pursuing the recommendations made in last April’s independent review by the former French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna.
That review was a travesty. Before the report was even written, Colonna said that her goal was to “enable donors … to regain confidence, when they have lost it or when they have doubts, in the way UNRWA operates.” Her report was drafted to achieve precisely that rather than stop the rot.
Far from tackling the agency’s terrorist ties, its commissioner-general, Philippe Lazzarini, has batted them away. He claimed implausibly that UNRWA didn’t know about the Hamas data center underneath its Gaza headquarters.
He denied that it employed terrorists and said this claim was part of a “large-scale campaign aimed at undermining the agency.” Having suspended the teachers’ union head Abu el Amin under pressure over the revelation of his Hamas role, Lazzarini reinstated him three months later under pressure of a strike by UNRWA teachers supporting their union’s head.
As for U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, he appeared to blame Israel for the Hamas Oct. 7 pogrom by saying it “did not happen in a vacuum” and has repeatedly parroted Hamas talking points.
Instead of holding the U.N.’s and UNRWA’s feet to the fire, Israel’s supposed allies in America and Britain have been threatening to cut off the Jewish state at the knees.
Having told Israel earlier this month that it must take steps within 30 days to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza or face potential restrictions on US military aid, the Biden-Harris administration threatened it with “consequences under U.S. law and US policy” over its UNRWA ban.
In Britain, there have been reports that the government may suspend further arms sales to Israel as punishment. The U.K. ambassador to the United Nations, Dame Barbara Woodward, said that Israel must “ensure UNRWA can continue to provide essential services to those suffering in Gaza and the West Bank.”
But UNRWA’s role is not as a dispassionate provider of essential services. It was actually created in 1949 as a weapon to delegitimize the State of Israel. While refugee status for all other peoples is considered a temporary measure, it’s permanent for the Palestinian Arabs. Under UNRWA’s unique designation, it’s passed down from generation to generation.
That’s why the number of Palestinian Arab “refugees” has ludicrously increased from 700,000 in 1948 to 5.9 million today—an ever-growing running sore whose toxicity is vastly increased by the hatred of Israel taught in UNRWA schools.
The pretense that UNRWA exists to provide for the suffering was finally ripped apart by the part its employees played in the Oct. 7 atrocities and in the war that has followed.
Israelis are no longer prepared to tolerate people who are trying to kill them and destroy their country while parading as humanitarian relief workers. Yet the United States, Britain and the United Nations are pressuring Israel to continue to keep this malign farce going.
Such people aren’t appalled by UNRWA. They’re appalled by the ban on it. That tells you everything you need to know about the war against Israel by the so-called civilized world.
The post The UNRWA Meltdown first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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John Fetterman Says His US Senate Votes Will ‘Follow Israel’ During Trump Presidency
US Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) gives an interview in his office in the Russell Senate Office Building in Washington, DC, Jan. 18, 2024. Photo: Rod Lamkey / CNP/Sipa USA for NY Post via Reuters Connect
US Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) on Thursday defended President Joe Biden’s record on Israel and stated that he plans on maintaining his support for pro-Israel efforts advanced by President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming administration.
During an appearance on the ABC talk show “The View,” Fetterman said that he would remain an “unapologetic” supporter of Israel during the Trump presidency and that he will continue to support legislation and initiatives that benefit the Jewish state.
“I’m a really strong, unapologetic supporter of Israel and it’s really not going to change for me when Trump becomes [president]. My vote and voice is going to follow Israel,” Fetterman said.
Fetterman also vouched for Biden’s record on Israel, although he conceded that he has disagreed with some of Biden’s policy positions regarding the Israel-Hamas war.
“I do think that the president has been a strong supporter of Israel, although there were times when I disagreed with some of the choices he made,” Fetterman said.
In the year following Hamas’s invasion of southern Israel last Oct. 7, Fetterman has emerged as a surprisingly stalwart ally of the Jewish state. He has regularly criticized other Democrats, including Biden, over their perceived fragile and unreliable support of Israel.
The lawmaker openly criticized Biden after the president threatened to withhold arms from Israel if the Jewish state greenlighted military operations in the city of Rafah in southern Gaza. Fetterman repudiated Biden’s ultimatum, saying that the US should “stand with our key ally throughout all of this.” He has also rebuffed pressure by progressives to adopt a more adversarial posture against Israel, saying that he does “not support any conditions” on American military aid to the Jewish sate.
Fetterman on Thursday also lauded Israel for its progress in deteriorating the Hamas terrorist group’s military capabilities. The senator asserted that Hamas needs to be completely eradicated and removed from the Gaza Strip.
“We cannot allow Hamas to function at all. They can’t be a part of any rebuilding Gaza or anything. Hamas has to surrender. It’ll be completely destroyed, and I think right now that largely that’s already happened now,” Fetterman said, adding that he wants to “salute what Israel has accomplished.”
The senator applauded the Jewish state, claiming “they destroyed Hamas, they’ve destroyed Hezbollah and, [they] exposed Iran as absolutely a paper tiger.” The Pennsylvania lawmaker added that Israel’s defensive military actions against Iran revealed that the regime is unable to hold the Middle East “in check.”
“Israel did the hard things and confronted these kinds of organizations and these proxies. And that’s why I’m proud to stand with Israel through it all, until absolutely through to the last hostages are brought back home,” Fetterman said.
The post John Fetterman Says His US Senate Votes Will ‘Follow Israel’ During Trump Presidency first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Democrats’ Support for Israel ‘Absolutely’ Contributed to US Presidential Election Loss, NC Party Chair Claims
Anderson Clayton, chair of the North Carolina Democratic Party, speaks after Democrat Josh Stein won the North Carolina governor’s race, in Raleigh, North Carolina, US, Nov. 5, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Jonathan Drake
Anderson Clayton, chair of the North Carolina Democratic Party, said in a new interview that Democrats’ general support for Israel’s defensive military operations against Hamas in Gaza contributed to their poor performance in last month’s elections.
Clayton made the remarks while appearing on the media outlet Zeteo this week to explain why she believes her party lost big across the US, most notably in the presidential election. Speaking with Mehdi Hasan, a journalist and outspoken critic of Israel, Clayton argued that the Democratic Party “abandoned” wide swaths of its voter base, adding that the party’s support for Israel likely alienated many younger voters.
When asked by Hasan whether the Israel-Hamas war resonated with the electorate in North Carolina, Clayton argued that the ongoing military conflict in Gaza “absolutely” eroded the Democrats’ standing with young voters.
As The Algemeiner reported, a survey of swing voters by Blueprint, a Democrat-leaning research firm, found the issue of Israel and the Palestinians barely registered as motivation for choosing Republican Donald Trump over Democrat Kamala Harris in the presidential race. Voters were more worried about inflation, immigration, and certain cultural issues. Among those voters for whom it was a factor, the survey found more people concerned that Harris was too “pro-Palestine” than those upset she was too “pro-Israel.”
Nonetheless, Hasan, citing anti-Israel protests at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, suggested that Democrats’ support for Israel disillusioned and enraged many young voters.
Clayton defended the “Uncommitted Movement” — an effort launched by anti-Israel activists to persuade the Democratic Party to officially endorse an arms embargo against the Jewish state and not support outgoing US President Joe Biden — as “using political power in the right way.”
She added that Democrats should be “embracing” anti-Israel efforts like the Uncommitted Movement, saying “that is something that we want so see more of in our party.”
The North Carolina Democratic Party has been plagued with accusations of antisemitism in the year following Hamas’s invasion of southern Israel last Oct. 7. Members of the state party refused to support a resolution condemning the terrorist attacks in Israel, sparking outrage among Jews within the state.
North Carolina Democrats also originally voted against the creation of an official Jewish caucus, despite already having similar groups for black and LGBT party members. Clayton was notably among 16 North Carolina Democrats who refused to vote on the creation of the caucus. After facing backlash, the party eventually voted to officially recognize the Jewish Caucus in December 2023.
Ryan Jenkins, the president of the Progressive Caucus of the North Carolina Democratic Party, attacked Jewish members of his party while defending the initial decision to block the recognition of a Jewish caucus.
“They have done nothing but whine and play the victim and attack people, and we are sick of it,” Jenkins said in reference to Jewish Democrats. “Every single abstention was a no vote that didn’t want to get targeted.”
“If the Democratic Party caves to it, that’s the end of the Democratic Party. We’re not Democrats; we’re the Jewish Caucus. We’re a Zionist group. Because they control everything,” Jenkins added. “We’re telling them very clearly they are allowed to threaten and bully us and they will get their way every single time and that our rules don’t apply.”
Leaders within the North Carolina Democratic Party have also accused Israelis of being “child killers” and have publicly participated in protests condemning the Jewish state. In 2022, the party infuriated North Carolina Jews when it passed a resolution accusing Israel of being an “apartheid state” that discriminates against Palestinians.
The post Democrats’ Support for Israel ‘Absolutely’ Contributed to US Presidential Election Loss, NC Party Chair Claims first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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US Sen. Tom Cotton Introduces Bill to Mandate Federal Usage of ‘Judea and Samaria’ Instead of ‘West Bank’
US Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) speaks during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, March 11, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Julia Nikhinson
US Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) has introduced legislation that would ban the federal government from using the term “West Bank” and instead use the terminology “Judea and Samaria.”
On Thursday, Cotton introduced the “Retiring the Egregious Confusion Over the Genuine Name of Israel’s Zone of Influence by Necessitating Government-use of Judea and Samaria (RECOGNIZING Judea and Samaria) Act.” The senator argued that the legislation would “align US policy language with the geographical and cultural significance of the region.”
“The Jewish people’s legal and historic rights to Judea and Samaria goes back thousands of years. The US should stop using the politically charged term West Bank to refer to the biblical heartland of Israel,” Cotton said in a statement.
US Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) — a stalwart ally of Israel, like Cotton — issued a statement in support of the bill, arguing that the official usage of Judea and Samaria is necessary in “defending the integrity of the Jewish state.”
“The Israeli people have an undeniable and indisputable historical and legal claim over Judea and Samaria, and at this critical moment in history, the United States must reaffirm this,” Tenney said. “This bill reaffirms Israel’s rightful claim to its territory. I remain committed to defending the integrity of the Jewish state and fully supporting Israel’s sovereignty over Judea and Samaria.”
US President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, has vowed to use the words Judea and Samaria in lieu of the West Bank.
“I can’t say something I don’t believe. As you well know, I’ve never been willing to use the term ‘West Bank.’ There is no such thing. I speak of Judea and Samaria,” Huckabee told Israeli media outlet Arutz Sheva in an interview. “I tell people there is no ‘occupation.’ It is a land that is ‘occupied’ by the people who have had a rightful deed to the place for 3,500 years, since the time of Abraham.”
If the US federal government were to adopt the official usage of Judea and Samaria instead of the West Bank, it would be aligning itself with the terminology preferred by Israel. Such a move could signal a shift in US policy closer to the Jewish state and in favor of further expansion of Jewish communities in the territory.
Critics have argued that such a shift in language could inflame tensions in the Middle East, complicating the possibility of reaching a two-state solution to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Following the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, in which the Jewish state secured its independence, the Kingdom of Jordan promulgated the term “West Bank” to describe the territory it controlled west of the Jordan River. Since Israel captured the area in the Six-Day War in 1967, it has governed them as Judea and Samaria.
The post US Sen. Tom Cotton Introduces Bill to Mandate Federal Usage of ‘Judea and Samaria’ Instead of ‘West Bank’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.