UNRWA warns of catastrophic consequences for education, health in Gaza

GAZA, Nov. 14 (YPA) – Commissioner-General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, warned that implementing the Israeli occupation’s Knesset legislation to ban the UN agency would have disastrous consequences.

“Dismantling UNRWA would lead to the collapse of the United Nations humanitarian response in Gaza, which relies heavily on the agency’s infrastructure, and would deprive half a million Palestinian refugees of primary health care in the West Bank,” Lazzarini said, during a session of the UN General Assembly’s committee.

He also warned that an entire generation of Palestinians in Gaza would be deprived of the right to education if the agency in the Strip collapsed under new occupation legislation.

“In the absence of a capable government or state administration, the UNRWA alone can provide education to more than 660,000 children across the Gaza Strip,” he said.

The UNRWA official reported that before the war, the agency was treating about 80% of the primary health care needs in the Gaza Strip, and continues to provide 16,000 medical consultations every day in Gaza.

“In the West Bank, the collapse of UNRWA would deprive at least 50,000 children of education, and half a million Palestinian refugees of primary health care,” Lazzarini said.

A series of investigations have been failed to find any evidence confirming the Israeli allegations against UNRWA, which has suffered heavy losses, after at least 223 of its employees have been killed in Gaza and two-thirds of its facilities in the Strip damaged or destroyed since the outbreak of the American-supported Israeli occupation aggression, which has led to killing and wounding 147,000 Palestinian, most of them children and women, and more than 10,000 missing,in a genocidal war on Gaza since October 7, 2023.

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