Israel on January 31 accused the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, of letting the militant group Hamas use its infrastructure in the Gaza Strip for military activity.
“UNRWA is a front for Hamas. It has been fundamentally compromised in three main ways: hiring terrorists on a massive scale, letting its infrastructure be used for Hamas military activity and relying on Hamas for aid distribution in the Gaza Strip,” government spokesman Eylon Levy said in a video statement.
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Mr. Levy alleged that 10% of UNRWA employees were members of Hamas or Islamic Jihad militant groups in Gaza, without providing any evidence.
“It is not a neutral organisation,” he said.
The U.N. agency has long been under scrutiny from Israel, which accuses it of systematically going against the country’s interests.
Last week Israel charged that a number of UNRWA employees were involved in the Hamas attack of October 7 on Israel, forcing several countries including the United States, Britain, Germany and Japan to cut suspend funding to the agency.
Israel has vowed to stop the agency’s work in Gaza after the war.
Mr. Levy’s comments on Tuesday came as U.N.’s coordinator for Gaza, Sigrid Kaag, said UNRWA could not be replaced by any other body.
“There is no way that any organisation can replace or substitute (the) tremendous capacity, the fabric of UNRWA — (their) ability and their knowledge of the population in Gaza,” said Mr. Kaag.
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