Israel bill banning UN Palestinian refugee agency 'opposed to international law': UN
The UN, on Monday, expressed “profound concern” over the recent introduction of draft bills in Israel’s parliament aiming to prevent the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) from continuing its operations in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza.
Dujarric stated that Israel’s proposed legislation aiming to halt UNRWA activities “would be diametrically opposed to the (UN) Charter and the Israeli government’s responsibility under international law.”
If the bill passed, he said they would assess the impact of the bill, but their response would be “negative”.
On Gaza, Dujarric stated that people in the north are in “desperate need of life saving assistance”.
Citing Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), he reported that Israel continues to deny the UN’s requests for food and fuel shipments to Jabalia and said that “intensive military operations” are ongoing around health facilities.
The spokesman also said that aid workers are “doing everything they can” to meet needs, but warned that ongoing impediments by Israel “are making it impossible for aid organisations to operate it anywhere near the scale that this crisis demands in southern Gaza.”
He also stated that Israel announced it had completed its raid on Kamal Adwan Hospital.
Responding to Anadolu’s question about possible mass graves at Kamal Adwan Hospital, similar to those found after Israeli forces withdrew from Al-Shifa and Nasser Hospitals, Dujarric said: “We don’t know what we will find.”
Emphasizing that UN’s primary focus is on how to deliver aid to the patients remaining in the Hospital, Dujarric further said that “it is clear that there will need to be accountability”.
Highlighting the difficulties of access, Dujarric said, “If we’re able to go and investigate, we will.”