Israel's continuous unsubstantiated claims against UNRWA

Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner-General

27 May 2025: From Philippe Lazzarini, the UNRWA Commissioner-General as posted on his official X account (previously known as Twitter)

Over the past 20 months, the Government of Israel has continuously made unsubstantiated claims against UNRWA and its neutrality.

These claims have put the lives of UNRWA staff at serious risk and harmed the reputation of the Agency.

In a letter I have recently written to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel, I repeated the concrete steps that UNRWA has taken for more than a decade in cooperation with the Government of Israel in line with transparency and neutrality.

In that regard, the Agency has requested on numerous occasions for cooperation from the Government of Israel by providing information and evidence to substantiate the accusations made against UNRWA.  

To date, UNRWA has not received any response, nor has the Government of Israel shared any sufficient evidence, to back up these very serious claims against the Agency and its personnel.

The UN depends on Member States for security and information concerning its premises and personnel.  

Member States – not the United Nations- are responsible for criminal investigations and prosecutions of armed militant activity.

It is expected that Member States will pursue their investigations in compliance with due process and report to the United Nations on the outcome of these processes where they may impact upon UN operations or staff.

In this case, the Government of Israel has neither shared adequate evidence with the UN to allow substantiation through administrative processes nor pursued its own criminal proceedings, which would also require the presentation of credible evidence and due process.  

Had the Government of Israel taken either of these steps and cooperated with UNRWA, the Agency could have acted in accordance with its regulations and due process.  

The minimum requirements are sufficient evidence and due process.  The absence of both more than one year later raises the possibility that the accusations were unfounded.

In the letter, I urged once again the State of Israel to renew the decades-long cooperation with UNRWA in line with the United Nations Charter and other international frameworks.

I have requested that they put an end to the unfounded dis-information campaign against the Agency.

I have also stated that UNRWA, together with other UN agencies, is ready to continue the critical work it does in humanitarian relief, education and health care to Palestine Refugees.

Gaza is a case in point where the Agency has the supplies and the structure to deliver at scale.

UNRWA is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. The United Nations General Assembly established UNRWA in 1949 with a mandate to provide humanitarian assistance and protection to registered Palestine refugees in the Agency’s area of operations pending a just and lasting solution to their plight.