The interim head of the United Nations agency that aids Palestinian refugees on Thursday accused pro-Israel groups of lobbying foreign parliaments to stop donations, even as it struggled to recover from losing US funding in 2018.
Christian Saunders said Israel was seeking to replace United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) services for Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem with those of its own.
UNRWA has faced budgetary difficulties since 2018, when the United States, its biggest donor, halted its annual aid of $360 million. The US and Israel have both accused UNRWA of mismanagement and anti-Israeli incitement.
Last November, UNRWA commissioner-general Pierre Krahenbuhl resigned amid an investigation into misconduct allegations.
In the interview, Mr Saunders, now acting commissioner-general, said the inquiry by the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services was complete and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had confirmed there had been no corruption or misuse of funds.
Mr Saunders said the investigation had uncovered mismanagement related to human resources and abuse of authority, and that major donors, who had withheld funding while the inquiry was under way, have resumed contributions.
Mr Saunders said he felt confident UNRWA had enough money for at least the first quarter of 2020, but he expected it to be an "even more difficult" year than last.
He said they had not given up on persuading Washington to change its mind about funding.
"We are engaged with the US, we will continue to engage with them in the hopes that they will see UNRWA as a reliable partner and worth supporting," Mr Saunders said.
He initially said that Israel and the US was "advocating against funding UNRWA in the European parliaments and elsewhere," but later clarified in a statement that he was referring to pro-Israel groups. He said UNRWA "had no reason to believe that the US was engaged in lobbying to stop funding the agency."
He said UNRWA was feeling "the pressure in East Jerusalem in particular", saying that Israel was in the process of building schools and institutions "to compete" with the agency and stop it from operating there.
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Amman Rajara ,20, carries a plate of humus and her child in the Aida refugee camp near Bethlehem. Aida is an urban slum with narrow winding streets and few sources of services besides the United Nations Relief and Works Agency. All photo by Heidi Levine for The National -
Palestinians carry cooking gain the entrance of the Aida refugee camp. It is one of the 19 camps for Palestinians in the West Bank. -
Palestinian Abdel Hadeef Abu Sul, 87, walks along Israel's separation camp near his home/ -
Anas Abu Srour, 30, was born and raised in the camp and feels that it is his obligation to stay. -
Motes Abu Khader, 26, and his mother Nada.47. Eight family members live in the home . -
Mutasem Abu Kheidar, 26, and his mother Nada.47,.They live in a simple home off of one of Aida’s narrow alleyways. -
A family seen in a street in the camp. -
as never known life without the Palestinian Authority, the semi-autonomous, nominally interim Palestinian government based in the occupied West Bank that the 1994 Oslo Accords instated. He has also not known life as a Palestinian refugee without UNRWA -
Momen Zboun, 20, spent 18 months in an Iraeli jail after being arrested at a demonstration. Heidi Levine for The National -
The symbolism of UNRWA is everywhere in Palestinian refugee camps across the West Bank and Gaza Strip: it is part and parcel to the workings of everyday life. -
Residents UNRWA “services used to be better” in their quality and quantity. He was not sure now what would happen to it – or to people like him in the absence of sufficient PA services to serve as an alternative.
"The important thing to remember here is that UNRWA has a mandate from the [UN] General Assembly, from the rest of the world, the member states, to provide services to Palestinian refugees in East Jerusalem," Saunders said.
Israel considers all of Jerusalem, including the eastern part captured along the West Bank in the 1967 Middle East war, as its "indivisible capital". Palestinians want East Jerusalem to be the capital of a state they seek to establish in the West Bank and Gaza.
Last month, the UN General Assembly renewed UNRWA's mandate for another three years. The agency aids more than 5 million registered refugees in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, as well as in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.
