The Commissioner-General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, confirmed today (Wednesday) that the agency urgently needs $190 million to maintain the basic services it provides until the end of the year.

In his speech at the opening session of the 160th session of the Arab League Council at the level of foreign ministers, which started earlier today at the headquarters of the General Secretariat of the Arab League in Cairo, Lazzarini stressed that achieving peace and finding a final and lasting solution to the Palestinian issue is the way to a permanent and final solution to the plight of refugees.

He said the agency needs another 75 million to maintain essential food supplies for the people of Gaza.

He added that the Palestinian refugees need education and job opportunities, and to be close to the global labor markets even if they live in Gaza, and they look forward to a more prosperous future.

Lazzarini pointed out the need for the Palestinians to get out of the status quo, which has ended, to a good path in which there will be a long-term solution.

He called on the Arab ministers to place the Palestinian refugees at the top of the priorities of Arab political action, stressing that this is the way to achieve hope in a Middle East in which peace lasts.

UNRWA was established as a United Nations agency by a decision of the General Assembly in 1949, and it was mandated to provide assistance and protection to Palestine refugees registered with it in the Agency’s fields of operations, namely the West Bank, which includes East Jerusalem, Gaza, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, until a just and lasting solution to their plight is reached.

UNRWA helps refugees realize their full potential in human development through the qualitative services it provides in the areas of education, health care, relief and social services, protection and camp infrastructure and improvement, microfinance and emergency aid.

UNRWA is funded almost entirely by voluntary contributions.