Fox’s first appearance – Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has announced that dozens of people employed by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the controversial UN aid agency responsible for the welfare of millions of Palestinian refugees and their descendants, will Israel said it had obtained new evidence that individuals were directly involved. FOX News Digital reveals the atrocities committed against Israeli civilians on October 7th.
Gallant said in a briefing with Fox News Digital this week that the country knows that “dozens” of UNRWA personnel are involved in Hamas-led genocide. Gallant declined to provide specific numbers, but said the number is significantly higher than the 12 employees the organization has already acknowledged and laid off last month.
The defense secretary, a member of Israel’s war cabinet and considered the second-highest ranking official after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, called UNRWA a “revamped Hamas” and said it was time for the world to “dismantle UNRWA” and create an alternative organization. said. A mechanism to provide aid to civilians in the war-hit Gaza Strip.
“I think the world needs to wake up and approach this problem in a different way, while also addressing the needs of Gaza,” Gallant told FOX News Digital. “UNRWA is a terrorist group paid by many countries, and these countries give money to the people it rapes, kills, and imprisons.”
UN appoints independent review of UNRWA amid allegations that UNRWA staff participated in Hamas-led attack on Israel
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant (right) speaks with U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin during a joint statement following talks on Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip, Monday, Dec. 25, in Tel Aviv, Israel. 18, 2023. (AP Photo/Maya Areruzzo)
On October 7, thousands of Palestinians led by terrorists from Hamas’s elite Nukba Force broke through the border fence from the Gaza Strip and entered Israel, killing 1,200 people at multiple military bases, towns, villages, and areas. killed more than one. At a local music festival. In addition, around 240 people were taken back to Gaza as hostages, including infants, children, women and the elderly. Almost four months later, more than 100 people are still detained.
The minister emphasized that many of those killed or kidnapped had dual Israeli and US citizenship.
Last month, UNRWA, which receives billions of dollars in funding from multiple countries including the United States and the European Union, acknowledged previous Israeli revelations that 12 of its staff were directly involved in the murder.
The United Nations headquarters and national flag are lined up with a photo of an Israeli woman kidnapped by Hamas terrorists. (Getty Images/Hamas Telegram)
The organization’s executive director Philip Lazzarini said at the time that the organization had decided to “immediately terminate the contracts of these employees and launch an investigation to uncover the truth without delay.”
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“UNRWA personnel involved in acts of terrorism will be held accountable, including criminal prosecution,” Lazzarini said in a statement, acknowledging that “Israeli authorities had provided information to UNRWA.”
At least 19 donor countries, including the United States, froze funding to the organization following Lazzarini’s announcement. The House Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday passed a bill 30-19 that would permanently end U.S. aid to UNRWA in response to the allegations.
However, especially at this critical stage, UNRWA and other non-profit organizations working within the Gaza Strip claim that a dire humanitarian crisis threatens thousands of people who have been forced from their homes during the period. Therefore, there are voices opposing the suspension of funding to UNRWA. Four months of fighting have destroyed medical systems and other critical infrastructure.
A man walks in front of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building during a UNRWA staff strike to demand higher salaries due to rising costs of living in Gaza City, Gaza, January 30, 2023. (Photo by Ali Jadallah/Anadolu Agency, Getty Images)
Despite past and present controversies, UNRWA and its Director-General were shortlisted for the Nobel Peace Prize this week.
This image, from undated body camera video footage taken by a downed Hamas terrorist and released by the Israel Defense Forces, shows the Hamas terrorist roaming through a residential area at an undisclosed location in southern Israel. It shows. The Israeli military gathered a group of foreign correspondents on Monday, October 16, 2023, to screen a 40-minute reel of gruesome footage compiled from the October 7 Hamas attack. (Israel Defense Forces, via AP)
On Monday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres appointed a commission to investigate what he called “alleged violations of the regulations, rules and codes of conduct of UN personnel.” Led by former French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna and supported by three international research institutes: Sweden’s Raoul Wallenberg Institute, Ch. A joint committee from Norway’s Mikkelsen Institute and the Danish Institute for Human Rights will work next week The plan is to start the process and submit an interim report by the end of March. The final report is expected to be completed by late April.
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From 2009 to 2024, just under $4 billion in taxpayer dollars went to humanitarian relief organizations, according to a Fox News Digital investigation. (Mahmoud Issa/SOPA Image/LightRocket, Getty Images)
A UNRWA spokesperson told FOX News Digital that to date, “the Israeli government has only officially notified UNRWA of approximately 12 personnel allegedly involved in the October 7 attack on Israel.” Told.
“This was a January 18 meeting between Israeli authorities and the head of UNRWA,” the spokesperson said. “It has not been shared by anyone,” he added.
Israel has long argued that UNRWA, created in 1949 to provide shelter, welfare and medical services to hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced during Israel’s creation, perpetuates the decade-long conflict. I’ve been doing it. The report found that while Palestinian refugees are the only group given their own independent aid agency, refugees from nearly every other global conflict, past and present, are It notes that it is the only country where refugees have been granted refugee status. Inherited.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (center) speaks with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant during a meeting with President Biden at the start of Israel’s wartime cabinet meeting as fighting continues between Israel and Israel on October 18, 2023 in Tel Aviv. . and the Palestinian organization Hamas. (Photo by Miriam Alster/Pool/AFP)
Israel also claims that UNRWA’s education system allows it to teach anti-Semitic tropes to hundreds of thousands of Palestinian students in schools in Gaza, the West Bank and other Arab countries where UNRWA operates. I have emphasized this many times. In January, UN Watch, an NGO that monitors UN bias against Israel, published a message celebrating the October 7 massacre that was shared on a social media group of about 3,000 UNRWA school teachers.
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Aerial view of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) tent camp. Hundreds of Gazan families fleeing Israeli attacks are trying to survive daily life with limited means and difficult conditions in Khan Yunis, Gaza Strip, November 25. 27, 2023. (Ashraf Amra/Anadolu via Getty Images)
One of the United Nations’ largest agencies, UNRWA employs more than 30,000 people worldwide and operates from two main headquarters in Amman, Jordan and Gaza. According to the latest statistics, approximately 5.9 million Palestinian refugees are eligible for UNRWA services, with an annual budget of more than $1 billion in 2022. Ninety percent of that funding comes from United Nations member states, with the United States, Germany and the European Union being the biggest contributors.
Speaking to ministers last week, Prime Minister Netanyahu said that the evidence that some UNRWA staff “participated in the atrocities and abductions of October 7… only strengthens what we have known for years: UNRWA is a solution.” It’s not part of the solution, it’s part of the solution.” That’s part of the problem. ”
