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Watchdog Identifies UN Agency Staff Who Participated in Oct. 7 Hamas Massacre
An aerial view shows the bodies of victims of an attack following a mass infiltration by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip lying on the ground in Kibbutz Kfar Aza, in southern Israel, Oct. 10, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Ilan Rosenberg
Two teachers hired by the United Nations agency responsible for Palestinian refugees participated in Hamas’ massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, according to new research published by an Israeli watchdog group.
The Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se) on Wednesday unveiled transcriptions of recordings confirming the roles of Yusef Zidan Sliman Al-Hawajri and Mamdouh Hussein Ahmad Al-Qek in the Hamas atrocities. Both teachers worked for the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) — the global organization’s agency dedicated solely to the refugees and descendants of Palestinians who fled during Israel’s 1948 War of Independence.
“We have female hostages, I captured one,” Al-Hawarji, who is both an Arabic teacher at the UNRWA-funded Deir al-Balah Boys’ Elementary School and a member of the Hamas Central Campus Brigade, can be heard saying in recordings obtained by IMPACT-se. “We will enter Al-Aqsa Mosque … they did actions for liberations [sic], God willing.”
Al-Hawarji also specifically alluded to kidnapping a “sabaya,” a term jihadists use to describe sex slaves.
In a separate recording quoted by the watchdog group, Al-Qek — another UNRWA elementary school teacher and a member of Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s (PIJ) Rafah Brigade — celebrated infiltrating Israeli territory during a phone call to family members, saying, “I’m inside! I’m with the Jews.”
PIJ, like Hamas, is an Islamist terrorist group based in Gaza committed to the destruction of Israel and the death of Jews. Its fighters participated in the Hamas-led Oct. 7 massacre, in which 1,200 people were murdered across southern Israel and about 240 others were kidnapped as hostages.
Both UNRWA teachers used their classrooms as platforms for promoting antisemitism and terrorism, according to Impact-se.
“This comes as no surprise, given that they worked in schools which routinely glorify jihad and incite violence,” Impact-se CEO Marcus Sheff said in a statement. “That Al-Hawarji and Al-Qek were employed by UNWRA, supported by international community funds, underscores the imperative that UNRWA is beyond salvation and can play no further role in Palestinian education.”
The new findings came after Impact-se released a separate report in November revealing that at least 14 teachers at UNRWA-run schools had praised the Oct. 7 pogrom carried out in southern Israel.
Complaints that UNRWA is promoting antisemitism and terrorism are not new.
Antisemitic and violent themes taught in Palestinian schools administered by UNRWA, as well as their employment of teachers linked to terrorist organizations, helped to inspire the extremism which resulted in Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre, experts told a US congressional subcommittee in January.
During the hearing, Sheff noted that “at least” 100 members of Hamas who have perpetrated previous acts of terrorism were schooled in UNRWA operated facilities and estimated that a majority of Hamas terrorists who participated in the Oct. 7 massacre were as well.
Antisemitic incitement and violence in Palestinian curricula has persisted despite years of outrage and international pressure to change the teaching materials. Study cards for 11th graders accusing Jews of being “in control of global events through financial power,” seventh graders instructed to describe Israeli soldiers as “Satan’s aides” in a textbook chapter imploring Muslims to “liberate” the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and children gathered to listen to a poem with the following line: “Give me a Kalashnikov, an [M-] 14, an axe and a knife” are just some of the examples of the themes to which Palestinian students have been exposed, according to numerous Impact-se reports.
In November, the US House of Representatives passed legislation that would require the US secretary of state to report annually on whether teaching materials provided to Palestinian students is promoting antisemitism and hatred of Israel. The bill now awaits consideration by the US Senate.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Watchdog Identifies UN Agency Staff Who Participated in Oct. 7 Hamas Massacre first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd
Magdeburg Christmas market, December 21, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Mang
i24 News – A suspected terrorist plowed a vehicle into a crowd at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, west of the capital Berlin, killing at least five and injuring dozens more.
Local police confirmed that the suspect was a Saudi national born in 1974 and acting alone.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz expressed his concern about the incident, saying that “reports from Magdeburg suggest something bad. My thoughts are with the victims and their families.”
Police declined to give casualty numbers, confirming only a large-scale operation at the market, where people had gathered to celebrate in the days leading up to the Christmas holidays.
The post Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister
A person waves a flag adopted by the new Syrian rulers, as people gather during a celebration called by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) near the Umayyad Mosque, after the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, Photo: December 20, 2024. REUTERS/Ammar Awad/File Photo
Syria’s new rulers have appointed Murhaf Abu Qasra, a leading figure in the insurgency which toppled Bashar al-Assad, as defense minister in the interim government, an official source said on Saturday.
Abu Qasra, who is also known by the nom de guerre Abu Hassan 600, is a senior figure in the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group which led the campaign that ousted Assad this month. He led numerous military operations during Syria’s revolution, the source said.
Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed “the form of the military institution in the new Syria” during a meeting with armed factions on Saturday, state news agency SANA reported.
Abu Qasra during the meeting sat next to Sharaa, also known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, photos published by SANA showed.
Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said this week that the defense ministry would be restructured using former rebel factions and officers who defected from Assad’s army.
Bashir, who formerly led an HTS-affiliated administration in the northwestern province of Idlib, has said he will lead a three-month transitional government. The new administration has not declared plans for what will happen after that.
Earlier on Saturday, the ruling General Command named Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as foreign minister, SANA said. A source in the new administration told Reuters that this step “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that bring peace and stability.”
Shibani, a 37-year-old graduate of Damascus University, previously led the political department of the rebels’ Idlib government, the General Command said.
Sharaa’s group was part of al Qaeda until he broke ties in 2016. It had been confined to Idlib for years until going on the offensive in late November, sweeping through the cities of western Syria and into Damascus as the army melted away.
Sharaa has met with a number of international envoys this week. He has said his primary focus is on reconstruction and achieving economic development and that he is not interested in engaging in any new conflicts.
Syrian rebels seized control of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war and ending his family’s decades-long rule.
Washington designated Sharaa a terrorist in 2013, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria. US officials said on Friday that Washington would remove a $10 million bounty on his head.
The war has killed hundreds of thousands of people, caused one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times and left cities bombed to rubble and the economy hollowed out by global sanctions.
The post Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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