Irish Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Michael Martin said that Israel launched a false and misleading campaign against the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees (UNRWA), and criticized the United States and called on it to rethink its decision to suspend support for UNRWA.

Martin spoke in a press conference on Thursday with UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini about a systematic attack targeting the agency, and stressed that without UNRWA there would be no basic services for the Palestinians in Gaza.

He stressed that "any attack on UNRWA would undermine the two-state solution," noting that "the entity that will administer Gaza after the war will not be able to carry out its tasks without UNRWA."

For his part, Lazzarini welcomed the announcement by Ireland and other European countries to maintain their financial support for the agency, and said that this constitutes a message to other countries.

He renewed his keenness to continue the agency's basic services in the region, and considered that dismantling the agency and suspending its funding "would be a disappointment to the Palestinians from the international community and would affect their lives, and would have serious repercussions and negative effects."

He warned that the absence of new contributions would cause a major shortage in the agency’s funding starting next April.

The Commissioner-General of UNRWA called on the Israeli government to cooperate with the agency in the accusations against its employees and to send all the facts, as he put it.

Since January 26, 18 countries and the European Union have suspended their funding to UNRWA, against the backdrop of Israeli allegations that employees of the agency participated in the attack carried out by the Palestinian resistance on October 7.

UN officials had warned of the catastrophic consequences of the steps taken by these countries towards the UN agency, stressing the impossibility of finding an alternative to the agency.

Source: Al Jazeera