NEW YORK, (PIC)
UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres has urged world leaders on Thursday to increase support for UNRWA, which provides vital humanitarian services for the Palestinian refugees, especially for those living in the war-torn Gaza Strip.
Guterres made his plea at a high-level meeting co-organized by Jordan and Sweden in support of UNRWA, which was held on the margins of the UN General Assembly meetings in New York.
“When we met one year ago, I spoke about putting ourselves in the shoes of Palestinians in Gaza. Of imagining what life must be like. I ended my remarks one year ago by saying: ‘This is the most dramatic humanitarian problem associated with the riskiest explosive potential.’ This was just days before the [events] of October 7, 2023,” Guterres said, addressing the attendees.
“Now, almost one year since that day, the situation for Palestinians in Gaza is beyond imagination. It has been said that ‘the United Nations was not created to bring us to heaven, but to save us from hell.’ Unfortunately, neither the United Nations nor anyone else that might have the power to do it was able to save the people of Gaza from hell.”
“We have failed the people of Gaza. They are in a living hell that somehow gets even worse by the day,” Guterres highlighted.
He emphasized that “there is no alternative to UNRWA” and urged all UN member states to “work on all fronts to intensify support for the agency’s vital mission.”
Guterres said UNRWA “is not a sustainable long-term solution to the plight of Palestine Refugees,” and reiterated his call for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, release of prisoners and a long-term political solution ending the occupation and leading to two states living side by side in peace and security.
“But until that moment, UNRWA remains indispensable,” he said, urging countries to provide “full support.”
The UN chief also said “two million Palestinians are now crammed into a space the size of the Shanghai International Airport. Existing — not living, but existing — among lakes of sewage, piles of rubbish and mountains of rubble. The only certainty they have is that tomorrow will be worse.”
“Yet if there is any outpost of hope in this hellscape, it is UNRWA,” he said.
The agency is facing immense challenges on the operational and political level, according to Guterres, who said that “222 UNRWA colleagues have been killed, many together with entire families, several in the line of duty,” and it is “the highest death toll in UN history.”
Guterres pointed to Israeli smear campaigns that “discredit the agency’s life-saving work,” and the draft legislation by Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, to classify UNRWA as a terrorist organization.
“In the face of the catastrophic conditions, UNRWA perseveres,” he said.
The UN chief expressed “full confidence in UNRWA’s continued commitment to upholding the humanitarian principles of neutrality, impartiality, and humanity.”
“Member states are showing that same confidence. Virtually all donors have reversed their funding suspensions. One hundred and twenty-three countries have signed up to the declaration on shared commitments to UNRWA. This underscores the consensus that UNRWA’s role across the occupied West Bank and the region is vital,” he underlined.
