The Secretary General of the United Nations (UN) Antonio Guterres appealed today to all countries to protect the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Middle East (UNRWA) and its staff.
“My appeal to everyone is this: protect UNRWA, protect UNRWA staff and protect UNRWA’s mandate, including its funding,” Guterres said at UN headquarters in New York at a conference on increasing contributions to UNRWA, and continued:
“Without the support and funding of UNRWA, Palestinian refugees will be left without a lifeline and the last glimmer of hope for a better future”.
Guterres added that it was time to finally end the “terrible war” in the Gaza Strip.
“Ultimately, only a political solution can end this conflict – a solution that would realize the vision of two states, Israel and Palestine living side by side in peace and security, with Jerusalem as the capital of both states,” Guterres said.
Speaking at the same conference, UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said the agency was facing many problems due to the relentless attacks in Gaza.
He recalled that 195 UNRWA workers were killed in Israeli attacks.
Riyad Mansour, Palestine’s UN envoy, told the conference that the past nine months had been long, painful and agonizing for Palestinians.
“There is no longer any safe place for our people in Gaza, not even under the UN flag, since schools are also a target of the Israeli occupation forces,” said Mansour.
Israel has been waging a devastating offensive against the Gaza Strip for more than nine months following a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on October 7, 2023 that killed around 1,200 people.
More than 38,300 Palestinians have since been killed in the Gaza Strip, and much of the territory of 2.3 million people has been reduced to rubble. Most of the civilian population has been displaced and is in imminent danger of starvation as Israel maintains strict restrictions on the delivery of humanitarian aid, AA writes.
