URNWA - Hamas investigation. Thread 2

Why is UNWRA viewed as a problem?
The vast majority of those registered with UNWRA have never fled their homes. Most are descendants now into their fifth generation.

Eligibility requirements to be recognised as a Palestinian refugee changed in 1965 to include third generation descendants. In 1982 eligibility changed again to include ALL descendants of Palestinian males. The Result?
The creation of a permanent and perpetually growing population of Palestinian refugees.

UNRWA refuses to divulge how many registered refugees meets its own original definition ' of having lived in Mandatory Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948'.
There are currently 5.9 million refugees. No one comes off the list.

UNWRA refuses to accept that people who are citizens of a country are refugees. Jordan granted citizenship to the Palestinian refugees who fled there including (at the time) those in the West Bank, which Jordan occupied between 1949 and 1967. So more than 2.2 million Palestinian refugees are actually citizens of a sovereign state.

The Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank consider themselves to be living in Palestine. They engage in efforts to have Palestine recognised as an existing state on International forums. So 1 million Palestinians in Gaza and 870,000 in the West Bank registered as refugees are actually living in what they themselves claim (and seek recognition of) as Palestine.
So what Palestine are these refugees from?
The Palestine that will one day replace Israel?

Had the rest of the world been registered as refugees in the same manner as UNWRA does for the Palestinians the (relative) peace that has marked much of the world since WW2 would have been replaced by constant war.
This is why in my view UNWRA should be dismantled/defunded.

Yes. Just dropping a few ready meals out of the sky will look nice on TV and a few trucks might make it past vigilante groups but flooding the market place and letting people who know the job just get on with it is what’s needed.

An added complication at this stage is that some of the children are probably too far gone to just recover as out patients. These kids will suffer lasting effects for the rest of their lives.

To quote Ken Roth also in the Gaurdian
“Israel also hopes to destroy Unrwa because the government naively believes that Palestinian refugees would then somehow forget that they are Palestinian refugees and stop insisting on a right to return.”

It's depressing. I think I read that, according to the Israeli Govt, 70% of Israelis do not want any aid allowed into Gaza. Happy to see people starve to death.

Another interesting article. I am understanding a bit more what other posters were referring to

"Indeed, the long-term problem is more profound, and it’s essential to understand because the Trump administration seeks to redefine what it means to be a Palestinian refugee, which in turn could have implications for refugees worldwide.
Underlying the Trump administration’s cuts to UNRWA is the false premise that Palestinian refugees derive their refugee status from UNRWA. They don’t. They derive it from international law. UNRWA’s role is simply to provide social services to these stateless refugees—not determine who is and who isn’t a refugee under international law."

I hadn't realised that Trump had cut Unrwa aid completely before. I'm educating myself on so many things now. For anyone else like me!
"Asked on Tuesday if the US should “get the right of return off the table”, the US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, said she thought it should.
“I do agree with that … I absolutely think we have to look at right of return,” she said, referring to the withdrawal of Palestinians’ right to reclaim property in Israel that they or their ancestors were forced to leave.Yaakov Amidror, a retired major general and former national security adviser to the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said closing UNRWA “in the long run, no question, is the right move to do”.
“Reduction in funds is one way to shut up and close UNRWA. How do you do it? By saying, ‘UNRWA, you don’t exist any more, with all due respect.’”
The German foreign minister, Heiko Maas, said: “The loss of this organisation could unleash an uncontrollable chain reaction.”

US confirms end to funding for UN Palestinian refugees | Palestinian territories | The Guardian

Real people that other people defend and support.

I can't believe that these are real people 🤦‍♀️

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/27/israeli-settlers-protest-un-agency-refugees-unrwa-jerusalem

Some very concerning statements in this article, made by protesters in Israel.

@ladystonehearts I wondered that.

BTW, do you get all your news from pro-Hamas twitter? Because that dedi medya account is really something else. Blatant anti-Semitism and Hamas propaganda.

well seems like those accused of being Hamas apologists were right

Even if a Hamas apologist happens to be right about something it doesn't make being a Hamas apologist okay.

Pretty atrocious way of looking at things. It’s as bad as all the people that think it’s necessary to starve and torture Palestinians. I’m calling it torture now, because that’s what I believe it is.

I don't believe anyone said he was. But the twitter account you posted has plenty of tweets calling Hamas a resistance group and one video where a man talks about how the October 7th attackers were breaking free from a cage to fight back.

If confirmed, that is essentially blackmailing a country into silence. I thought Trump wasn't in office yet...

There have been multiple posts on this thread and others with just a link and no opinion. Why aren't you jumping down their throats?