Gaza and Charities at War: Israel Bans UNRWA
The world should criticize Israel for banning UNRWA. UNRWA might not be perfect. But this ain’t no way to run a war. Look, I am nobody’s General and my family and fellow citizens’ massacre wasn’t live-streamed on October 7, last year. So don’t misunderstand me. If it had been me or mine, you’re damn right I would want my country and her allies to rain fire and brimstone on the perpetrators even if a few or a lot of innocent noncombatants got some of it too. They probably deserve it anyway, is what I would be thinking. I’d be in my rage. I get it.
The Law of War doesn’t often constrain the belligerents in the thick of it. From the squad level all the way up to its highest offices, belligerents want to force the other side to surrender and will do whatever it takes. That’s what we would all do as belligerents. It is up to the rest us who are not belligerents in the particular dispute and who are not blinded by a belligerent’s rage to insist upon and enforce limits on the expression of that rage. In my rage, I would impose a blockade around my enemy’s area of operations. I would starve them out of hiding to kill them even if others have to starve or might get killed too. It’s war. But my impunity would still constitute a crime insofar as men, women and children are unnecessarily starved or killed. And for the sake of my moral humanity, I hope the world would try to convince me to constrain my justifiable rage. That’s why the world should criticize Israel for banning UNRWA.
From The Associated Press
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Israel’s parliament has passed two laws that could prevent the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, a main provider of aid to Gaza, from being able to continue its work. The laws ban the agency, UNRWA, from operating and cut all ties between the agency and the Israeli government. It’s the culmination of a long-running campaign against the agency, which Israel contends has been infiltrated by Hamas. But supporters say Israel’s real aim is to sideline the issue of Palestinian refugees. The agency is the major distributor of aid in Gaza and provides education, health and other basic services to millions of Palestinian refugees across the region, including in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The head of the agency, Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini, called the move “unprecedented” on X following the vote and said the bills “will only deepen the suffering Palestinians, especially in Gaza where people have been going through more than a year of sheer hell.”
Israel accuses the agency of turning a blind eye to staff members it says belong to Hamas, divert aid and use UNRWA facilities for military purposes. Israel says around a dozen of its 13,000 employees in Gaza participated in the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel. The agency denies it knowingly aids armed groups and says it acts quickly to purge any suspected militants among its staff. One of the bills passed Monday evening bans all UNRWA activities and services on Israeli soil and is set to take effect in three months.
The second bill severs all ties between government employees and UNRWA and strips its staff of their legal immunities. Together, the bills likely bar the agency from operating in Israel and the Palestinian territories, because Israel controls access to both Gaza and the West Bank. It could force the agency to relocate its headquarters from Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem.
I’ve said it before. In war, you find and you kill the enemy. You don’t go demonizing Civil Society for its imperfect efforts to stop the suffering.
darryll k. jones