a group of Democratic lawmaker The US has been called on to restore funding to the controversial UN agency, which provides much-needed humanitarian aid to Palestinian refugees but is accused of having some of its staff take part in attacks on Israel on October 7.
Speaking at a press conference outside the US Capitol on Thursday afternoon, Democratic Representatives Andre Carson of Indiana, Pramila Jayapal of Washington and Jan Schakowsky of Illinois said it was critical to pass HR 9649, or the UNRWA Funding Emergency Restoration Act. Helping the people of Gaza.
Carson, who sponsored the bill, described the current conditions in Gaza as “absolutely reprehensible” and “inhumane,” describing the situation as dire.
“One million. This is the estimated number of people in Gaza who will not get enough food this month. 700,000. This is the number of women and girls in Gaza who do not have access to menstrual products or even running water and toilet paper. 100,000. This is the number of Palestinians who are seriously injured without access to working hospitals. 41,000. This is the number of Palestinians killed by Israel since October 7,” Carson said.
Israel strikes Hezbollah targets in Lebanon after two device explosions
Rep. Andre Carson, D-Indiana, speaking at a press conference on Feb. 29. (Celal Gunes/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Jayapal said UNRWA has for decades “played a vital role in supporting the welfare of Palestinian refugees, to ensure they can live with dignity.”
“Unfortunately, UNWRA is under constant attack by those who want to stop this lifesaving work. Blocking funding is an unnecessary and dangerous obstacle to the delivery of humanitarian assistance, which is so essential,” he said.
United Nations Relief And the Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, or UNRWA, has been one of the central agencies distributing aid to Palestinians in Gaza during Israel’s ongoing war with Hamas. It has about 30,000 staff.
In January, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres tasked the UN’s investigative arm, the Office of Internal Oversight Services, to investigate Israeli allegations that UNRWA staff took part in the October 7 massacre.
The Israeli government recently provided UNRWA with the names of staff working as terrorists within the organization. (Getty Images)
About 20 UNRWA staff members were investigated, but the UN found enough evidence to dismiss only nine.
Nevertheless, Israel’s allegations initially caused top donor countries – notably the US – to halt funding to UNRWA, leading to a cash shortfall of $450 million. Since then, all donor countries except the US have resumed funding.
Iranian Netanyahu assassination plot foiled, Israeli man charged
Schakowsky said it was “shameful” that the US had decided to cut funding to UNRWA, since only a “small number” of the agency’s approximately 30,000 staff have been accused of involvement in terrorist activities.
“Every other country among our allies who had decided to stop funding UNRWA has changed its mind. So now it’s only the United States,” Schakowsky said. “And the fact that the United States has decided it’s not going to be there means that there is a threat to the people who are dying, in danger of dying every day, including children and women and families and everyone who is dying for their basic needs. And that’s shameful. We can’t allow that.”,
HR 9649 has 65 co-sponsors and the support of more than 100 human rights organizations. But not everyone is in favor of restoring funding.
Anne Bayefsky, director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust and president of Human Rights Voice, said lawmakers’ support of HR 9649 conceals UNRWA’s alleged “ties to terrorism” and sends “the wrong message to Israel and America’s enemies at the wrong time.”
“Let’s make the facts clear: UNRWA staff directly participated in the October 7 atrocities; 10% of UNRWA staff are reported to have ties to multiple Palestinian terrorist organizations; a significant percentage of UNRWA’s senior education leadership are members of Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad,” Bayefsky said in a statement to Fox News Digital.
Bayefsky also said that “UNRWA facilities – including schools – have been used as Hamas command and control centres and weapons depots (and) UNRWA’s Gaza headquarters houses a Hamas data centre located right below it.”
Bayefsky criticized UNRWA for not taking “serious steps toward accountability or prevention… while at the same time demanding more funding.”
“This is not a small drop in an imaginary ocean of humanitarianism,” Bayefsky said. “UNRWA’s ties to Palestinian terrorism arise from indoctrinating a generation of Palestinian Arabs with hatred of Jews in their schools, inverting the meaning of ‘refugee’ into a means to destroy the Jewish state, and spreading slanderous lies guaranteed to undermine peaceful coexistence between Palestinians and Israelis is damaging to all.”
Click here to get the Fox News app
Fox News Digital has reached out to UNRWA for comment on HR 9649. Meanwhile, the UN told Fox News Digital that it “does not comment on countries’ laws. But we have been clear that UNRWA is the backbone of humanitarian assistance for the Palestinian people and must be supported.”
