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UNRWA Is a Terrorist-Supporting Disaster; But New Israeli Law Won’t Stop It
An UNRWA aid truck at the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip. Photo: Reuters/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, is the United Nations body responsible for providing aid to Palestinians.
The UN agency has also been exposed as supporting Hamas, teaching Nazi ideology to Palestinian children, and even participating in the October 7 massacre. Indeed, after his assassination by Israeli forces, Hamas chief and October 7 mastermind Yahia Sinwar was found with cash, weapons, and (wait for it…) an UNRWA ID card.
It therefore came as no surprise when, last October, the Israeli Knesset passed a law banning the UNRWA organization in Israel.
At the time, my organization published a proper legal analysis on our Substack page, which indicated that, aside from some short term virtue signaling, the new Israeli law was unlikely to have any impact at all. The law officially took effect last Thursday, and as predicted, it is having little practical impact on security, but it is creating diplomatic and public relations problems for Israel. Here’s what you need to know.
Under Israel’s new law, UNRWA is not permitted to “operate any institution, provide any service, or conduct any activity, whether directly or indirectly,” in the sovereign territory of Israel.
However, by Israeli law, neither Gaza nor Judea/Samaria (the “West Bank”) are Israeli “sovereign territory” and for good reason.
In order to become sovereign territory, Israel must perform a legal act called “annexation.” For example, in 1967, Israel annexed the eastern portion of Jerusalem, and did the same in 1981 with respect to the Golan Heights. Israelis have at times debated whether to annex parts of Gaza and Judea/Samaria, but Israel has never actually done so, because, among other things, this would likely end Israel’s existence as a Jewish state.
Under both international law and Israel’s own citizenship laws, Israel is required to offer full citizenship to all people living in an annexed area, regardless of religion, ethnicity, or national origin, and indeed, Israel has done so in both Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. To do otherwise would effectively create multiple classes of citizens with different rights, which is anathema to most Israelis as well as to any true democracy. Accordingly, to annex Judea/Samaria and Gaza as sovereign Israeli territory would mean adding millions of voting, Palestinian citizens to Israel’s democratic system.
But how many?
The Palestinian population of the West Bank and Gaza stands at 5.5 million, while the Muslim population within Israel is approximately 2 million, for a total of 7.5 million. This is more than the Jewish population, which is 7.1 million. After including Christians and other ethnicities, Jews would become an even smaller minority of total voters, and by the next election, Israel would cease to be a Jewish state at all.
Some people question whether Palestinian population figures are exaggerated, but even if they are, and even if Israeli Jews were to maintain a slim voting majority, Israel’s character as both democratic and also Jewish would be in constant jeopardy, and unlikely to last long term.
In short, most of the areas where UNRWA operates are not Israeli “sovereign territory” according to Israeli law, and therefore not covered by the new anti-UNRWA law. Under this new law, UNRWA is therefore continuing to operate in Gaza and Judea/Samaria, and in all likelihood, will continue its involvement in terror activities against Israelis.
Though the new law will likely be ineffective at curbing UNRWA’s terror activities, it will be quite effective at creating new international problems for Israel.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres stated that the new Israeli law will be “devastating” for Palestinian civilians, a view that is echoed by much of the international community. Guterres’ statement is based on the patently false claim that there is “no alternative” to UNRWA.
In fact, there are multiple channels for delivering humanitarian aid, including other (potentially less corrupted) UN agencies, such as UNHCR, or UNICEF, as well as governments and private contractors.
Guterres further claims that Israel’s anti-UNRWA legislation violates international law. This assertion is simply untrue.
On the one hand, the IDF has implemented a legal blockade on Gaza, making Israel responsible for providing humanitarian aid to local civilians. Similarly, Israel’s Supreme Court has ruled in multiple cases that Israel must follow the international rules related to “belligerent occupation” in Judea/Samaria, rules which include the provision of humanitarian aid. However, international law says nothing about which entity is required to provide such aid.
Therefore, as long as Israel provides the required aid through some mechanism, there is absolutely no requirement to work through UNRWA. This would be the case even if Israel’s law prohibited UNRWA from operating in Gaza and Judea/Samaria, which it does not.
In any case, the opinion of the United Nations holds little credibility for most Israelis in the wake of the international body’s support for Hamas terrorism and its direct participation in the October 7 massacre (via its UNRWA agency). Nonetheless, the widespread (albeit inaccurate) view that Israeli actions are “devastating” or even “illegal” does influence other parties that are relevant to Israel, including the United States.
The Biden administration sent a strongly worded letter to Israel on October 13, 2024, effectively threatening an arms embargo unless Israel took certain actions within 30 days: one of the demands was that Israel not pass any laws against UNRWA — exactly what Israel did just days later. The American letter points to US National Security Memorandum 20 and Section 620i of the US Foreign Assistance Act, both of which are essentially mechanisms for cutting off foreign aid from US allies: a not-so-subtle threat to abandon Israel’s critical self-defense, in order to protect the close partner of a terror organization.
Indeed, the Biden White House did freeze a variety of items that Israel urgently needed, a practice that Trump undid by executive order shortly after taking office.
While it is unlikely that the Trump administration would actually carry out threats made by the Biden White House, the principle nonetheless opens Israel up to a variety of diplomatic attacks and embargoes by other countries, as well as by the United States under a future, less supportive, administration. It is arguably worth taking such risks in order to protect Israelis from terror attacks, but with UNRWA continuing to operate in Gaza and Judea/Samaria, the current Israeli law will not accomplish its intended security impact.
What would be effective? The Knesset introduced a bill last July to declare UNRWA a designated terror organization under Israeli law. Such a designation would allow Israel a variety of legal and security tools that could curb UNRWA’s harmful activities in a meaningful way, including in Gaza and Judea/Samaria. However, not only would passing such a law put Israel on a collision course with its key allies, but enforcement could result in Israel arresting, prosecuting, and potentially even engaging in combat with a UN agency.
Ultimately the problem Israel faces is bigger than UNRWA — it is that the Western world is engaging in widespread appeasement of terror organizations and their patrons. Until this reality changes, the tools available to Israel to protect its citizens from terrorism will remain tragically, and dangerously, limited.
Daniel Pomerantz is the CEO of RealityCheck, an organization dedicated to deepening public conversation through robust research studies and public speaking.
The post UNRWA Is a Terrorist-Supporting Disaster; But New Israeli Law Won’t Stop It first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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As Gaza War Continues, Hamas Calls for Global Protests While Israel Marks Breakthroughs in Medical Innovation
A pro-Hamas march in London, United Kingdom, Feb. 17, 2024. Photo: Chrissa Giannakoudi via Reuters Connect
As the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas calls for global protests amid stalled Gaza ceasefire talks, Israel has broken new ground despite the ongoing conflict, achieving a major medical breakthrough in synthetic human kidney development.
The contrast illustrates a stark contrast between the priorities of Hamas, an international designated terrorist group that has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, and Israel, the lone democracy in the Middle East that has long been a leader in tech and medical innovation.
On Wednesday, Hamas urged worldwide protests in support of Palestinians, calling on the international community “to denounce Israel’s genocidal war and starvation policy in Gaza.”
“We call for continuing and escalating the popular pressure in all cities and squares on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday … through rallies, demonstrations and sit-ins outside the embassies of the Israeli regime and its allies, particularly in the US,” the statement read.
The Palestinian terrorist group also called to expose what it described as “the terrorism of the Zio-Nazi occupation against defenseless civilians.”
Hamas’s latest move against Israel comes amid stalled indirect negotiations over a proposed 60-day ceasefire and hostage release deal, which collapsed last month after the group vowed it would not disarm unless an independent Palestinian state is established — rejecting a key Israeli demand to end the war in Gaza.
In its statement, Hamas demanded the opening of all border crossings to allow immediate aid into the war-torn enclave and urged a global condemnation of “the international community’s inaction on the Israeli crimes.”
Amid mounting international pressure to address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Israel announced new measures to facilitate the delivery of aid, including temporary pauses in fighting in certain areas and the creation of protected routes for aid convoys.
Israeli officials have previously accused Hamas of diverting aid for terrorist activities and selling supplies at inflated prices to civilians, while also blaming the United Nations and other foreign organizations for enabling this diversion.
Hamas’s statement also emphasized that the “global resistance movement must continue until Israeli aggression on Gaza ends and the siege on the coastal strip is lifted.”
Meanwhile, as Israel faces escalating hostilities and the heavy toll of war, the Jewish state continues to push the boundaries of innovation and resilience, achieving new medical breakthroughs while confronting ongoing challenges.
In a major medical breakthrough, scientists at Sheba Medical Center and Tel Aviv University have successfully grown a synthetic 3D miniature human kidney in a lab using specialized stem cells derived from kidney tissue — one of the most promising advances in regenerative medicine.
Dr. Dror Harats, chairman of Sheba’s Research Authority, described this achievement as a reflection of Israel’s leading role in global medical innovation.
“Despite growing efforts to isolate Israel from international science, breakthroughs like this prove our impact is both lasting and essential,” he said.
In a landmark study, a team from Sheba’s Safra Children’s Hospital and Tel Aviv University’s Sagol Center for Regenerative Medicine created synthetic kidney organs that matured and remained stable for 34 weeks — the longest-lasting and most refined kidney organoids developed to date.
Nearly a decade ago, the research team became the first to successfully isolate human kidney tissue stem cells — the cells responsible for the organ’s development and growth.
Previous attempts to grow kidneys in a lab using general-purpose stem cells were short-lived, typically lasting only a few weeks and often producing unwanted cell types that compromised research accuracy.
However, this Israeli research team used stem cells taken directly from kidney tissue — cells that naturally develop into kidney parts — allowing them to create a much purer and more stable model with key features found in real kidneys.
This medical breakthrough could have far-reaching implications, redefining the current understanding of kidney diseases and advancing the development of innovative treatments.
Researchers believe the model could help assess how medications impact fetal kidneys during pregnancy and move science closer to repairing or replacing damaged kidney tissue with lab-grown cells.
The discovery came days after researchers from Hebrew University of Jerusalem and international partners discovered a way to boost the immune system’s cancer-fighting ability by reprogramming how T cells, which are white blood cells critical to the immune system, produce energy.
The researchers explained in a study published in the peer-reviewed Nature Communications that disabling a protein known as Ant2 in T cells greatly enhances their effectiveness against tumors.
“By disabling Ant2, we triggered a complete shift in how T cells produce and use energy,” Prof. Michael Berger of Hebrew University’s Faculty of Medicine, who co-led the study with doctorate student Omri Yosef, told the Tazpit Press Service. “This reprogramming made them significantly better at recognizing and killing cancer cells.”
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Netherlands to Push EU to Suspend Israel Trade Deal but Won’t Recognize Palestinian State ‘At This Time’
Netherlands Foreign Affairs Minister Caspar Veldkamp addresses a press conference, in New Delhi on April 1, 2025. Photo: ANI Photo/Sanjay Sharma via Reuters Connect
The Netherlands is spearheading efforts to suspend the European Union-Israel trade agreement amid rising EU criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza, while simultaneously refusing to recognize a Palestinian state, contrasting with other member states as international pressure mounts.
On Thursday, Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp announced that the Netherlands will push the EU to suspend the trade component of the EU-Israel Association Agreement — a pact governing the EU’s political and economic ties with the Jewish state.
This latest anti-Israel initiative follows a recent EU-commissioned report accusing Israel of committing “indiscriminate attacks … starvation … torture … [and] apartheid” against Palestinians in Gaza during its military campaign against Hamas, an internationally designated terrorist group.
Following calls from a majority of EU member states for a formal investigation, this report built on Belgium’s recent decision to review Israel’s compliance with the trade agreement, a process initiated by the Netherlands and led by EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas.
According to the report, “there are indications that Israel would be in breach of its human rights obligations” under the 25-year-old EU-Israel Association Agreement.
While the document acknowledges the reality of violence by Hamas, it states that this issue lies outside its scope — failing to address the Palestinian terrorist group’s role in sparking the current war with its bloody rampage across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Israeli officials have slammed the report as factually incorrect and morally flawed, noting that Hamas embeds its military infrastructure within civilian targets and Israel’s army takes extensive precautions to try and avoid civilian casualties.
In a Dutch parliamentary debate on Gaza on Thursday, Veldkamp also announced that the government would not recognize a Palestinian state for now — a position that stands in sharp contrast to the recent moves by several other EU member states to extend recognition.
“The Netherlands is not planning to recognize a Palestinian state at this time,” the Dutch diplomat said.
“This war has ceased to be a just war and is now leading to the erosion of Israel’s own security and identity,” he continued.
This latest decision goes against the position of several EU member states, including France, which has committed to recognizing Palestinian statehood in September.
The United Kingdom has likewise indicated it will do so unless Israel acts to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and agrees to a ceasefire.
For its part, Germany said it was not planning to recognize a Palestinian state in the short term, and Italy argued that recognition must occur simultaneously with the recognition of Israel by the new entity.
Spain, Norway, Ireland, and Slovenia all recognized a Palestinian state last year.
Israel has been facing growing pressure from several EU member states seeking to undermine its defensive campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza.
On Thursday, European Commission Vice President Teresa Ribera strongly condemned Israel’s actions in the war-torn enclave, describing the situation as a “grave violation of human dignity.”
“What we are seeing is a concrete population being targeted, killed and condemned to starve to death,” Ribera told Politico. “If it is not genocide, it looks very much like the definition used to express its meaning.”
Until now, the European Commission has refrained from accusing Israel of genocide, but Ribera’s comments mark one of the strongest European condemnations since the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
She also called on the EU to take decisive action by considering the suspension of its trade agreement with Israel and the implementation of sanctions, while emphasizing that such measures would require unanimous approval from all member states.
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Graduate Student Unions Promoting Antisemitism, Reform Group Says
Students listen to a speech at a protest encampment at Stanford University in Stanford, California US, on April 26, 2024. Photo: Carlos Barria via Reuters Connect.
Higher-education-based unions controlled by United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America (UE) are rife with antisemitism and anti-Zionist discrimination, according to a new letter imploring the US Congress’s House Committee on Education and the Workforce to address the matter.
“Tracing its roots to communism in the 1930s, the UE is a radical, pro-Hamas labor union that has a long history of antisemitism,” the National Right to Work Foundation (NRTW), one of the US’s leading labor reform groups, wrote on July 30 in a message obtained by The Algemeiner. “The UE openly supports the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which is designed to cripple and destroy Israel economically. Today, the UE furthers its antisemitic agenda by unionizing graduate students on college campuses and using its exclusive representation powers to create a hostile environment for Jewish students. The hostile environment includes demanding compulsory dues to fund the UE’s abhorrent activities.”
NRTW went on to describe a litany of alleged injustices to which UE members subject Jewish student-employees in the US’s most prestigious institutions of higher education, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to Cornell University. At MIT, the letter said, “union officers” aided a riotous group which illegally occupied a section of campus with a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment,” participating in the demonstration and even denying access to campus buildings. UE members at Stanford University, meanwhile, allegedly denied religious accommodations to Jewish students who requested exemption from union dues over that branch’s supporting the BDS movement. And Cornell University UE was accused of denying religious exemptions in several cases as well and followed up the rejection with an intrusive “questionnaire” which probed Jewish students for “legally-irrelevant information.”
The situation requires federal oversight and intervention, NRTW said, including Congress’s possibly clarifying that student-employees are not traditional employees and are therefore afforded protections under sections of the Civil Rights Act which apply to the campus.
“These continuing patterns of antisemitism are illegal, immoral, and must be stopped,” the letter continued. “We encourage you to do all that is in your power to investigate and help bring an end to the UE and its affiliates’ nonstop harassment and intimidation of Jewish students … The Trump administration can also use tools available to it under Title VI and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act against colleges who work with unions to create a hostile environment for Jewish students.”
July’s letter is not the first time NRTW has publicized alleged antisemitic abuse in unions representing higher education employees.
In 2024, it represented a group of six City University of New York (CUNY) professors, five of whom are Jewish, who sued to be “freed” from CUNY’s Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY) over its passing a resolution during Israel’s May 2021 war with Hamas which declared solidarity with Palestinians and accused the Jewish state of ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and crimes against humanity. The group contested New York State’s “Taylor Law,” which it said chained the professors to the union’s “bargaining unit” and denied their right to freedom of speech and association by forcing them to be represented in negotiations by an organization they claim holds antisemitic views.
That same year, NRTW prevailed in a discrimination suit filed to exempt another cohort of Jewish MIT students from paying dues to the Graduate Student Union (GSU). The students had attempted to resist financially supporting GSU’s anti-Zionism, but the union bosses attempted to coerce their compliance, telling them that “no principles, teachings, or tenets of Judaism prohibit membership in or the payment of dues or fees” to the union.
“All Americans should have a right to protect their money from going to union bosses they don’t support, whether those objections are based on religion, politics, or any other reason,” NRTW said at the time.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.