The Commissioner-General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, said that the political repercussions of the collapse of UNRWA are catastrophic and will have dire consequences for international peace and security.

Lazzarini added in a letter to UN General Assembly President Philomon Yang that attacks on the agency would lead to unilateral changes in the parameters of any future political solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and harm the Palestinians' right to self-determination and their aspirations for a political solution.

He pointed out that the Israeli Knesset's adoption of two laws regarding UNRWA effectively deprives it of the protection and basic means necessary for its work, after a year of blatant disregard for the lives of its employees, buildings and humanitarian operations in Gaza, and after intensive diplomatic campaigns by the Israeli government targeting UNRWA donors with misleading information to undermine funding.

He pointed out that these developments threaten the collapse of UNRWA operations in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip, and severely undermine the entire UN humanitarian operation in Gaza, which depends on UNRWA, and that the absence of any alternative to the agency capable of continuing and surviving will exacerbate the suffering of the Palestinians.

“The situation in Gaza goes beyond the diplomatic vocabulary of the General Assembly,” Lazzarini said in his message. “Palestinian lives have been devastated by more than a year of the most intense bombardment of the civilian population since World War II. Humanitarian aid has been restricted to below the bare minimum. Schools, universities, hospitals, places of worship, bakeries, water and sewage networks, electricity, roads and agricultural land have been destroyed. Survivors live in the most humiliating conditions, trapped and waiting to die by airstrikes or starve.”

He stressed that dismantling UNRWA would have a catastrophic impact on the international response to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, noting that no one other than UNRWA would be able to provide education for 660,000 boys, and an entire generation of children would be sacrificed, with long-term risks of marginalization. In the West Bank, refugees would be deprived of access to education and primary health care, exacerbating an already unstable situation.

He pointed out that these attacks will not lead to the end of the status of Palestinian refugees, which exists independently of the services provided by UNRWA, but they will cause severe harm to their lives and future.

The Commissioner-General of UNRWA called for support from member states of the United Nations General Assembly, in proportion to the gravity of the situation and the risks, to ensure the agency's ability to fully implement the mandate granted to it by the General Assembly in accordance with Resolution 302 (IV) of 1949.