Middle East Eye
Trump's Board of Peace says Unrwa has 'no place' in Gaza
Trump's Board of Peace says Unrwa has 'no place' in Gaza
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Thu, 07/02/2026 - 09:19
US ambassador Jeff Bartos called on nations to stop funding Unrwa and instead direct their financial support at the annual UN pledging conference on Tuesday
A displaced Palestinian woman uses a piece of cardboard to fan her sleeping daughter as they shelter at a school on a hot day, in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, 1 July 2026 (Reuters)
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US President Donald Trump's Board of Peace has said that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (Unrwa) "has no place in new Gaza".
In a post on X, the Board said that: "We are turning a page on the complex of perpetual aid dependency and conflict. The people of Gaza deserve better."
The board retweeted a speech by US ambassador Jeff Bartos at the annual UN pledging conference on Tuesday, calling on nations to stop funding Unrwa and instead direct their financial support.
"You can choose to fund incitement, terrorism, and stagnation, or you can choose to fund the Board of Peace, giving Gazans a path to peace, prosperity and real, durable change," Bartos said.
Unrwa serves around 5.9 million Palestinian refugees across Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.
It is the main UN agency operating in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, overseeing the majority of aid distribution in the enclave.
In Gaza, much of the strip’s 2.2 million population depends on Unrwa for food, shelter, healthcare and education. Smaller aid groups rely on their distribution networks to operate.
But since March 2025, an Israeli ban on the agency's operations in Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territories has effectively barred the organisation from directly bringing in staff and aid into Gaza, severely curtailing its activities in the besieged enclave.
Unrwa said that as a result, it has been unable to distribute warehouses full of aid waiting outside Gaza, including "enough food parcels, flour, and shelter supplies for hundreds of thousands of people".
The Palestinian Authority rejected the board's comments, affirming that the agency remains “an indispensable lifeline” for Palestinians, and plays an "essential role" in the provision of education, healthcare, and emergency assistance across the occupied Palestinian territories.
In February, an Israeli High Court temporarily halted a ban on 37 international aid groups - including Medecins Sans Frontieres, Oxfam, Save the Children, ActionAid and the Norwegian Refugee Council. The organisations had been informed in December that they would need to fulfil stringent new regulations, including the disclosure of details of their staff members, in order to continue operating in Gaza.
A report by the UN humanitarian office, OCHA, in June described the situation in Gaza as "volatile and insecure", with the majority of the population confined to "shrinking and overcrowded spaces where essential services are overstretched", with limited acces to safe water and "solid waste accumulating in residential areas".
The report added that the situation is further exacerbated by tightening Israeli restrictions on the passage of aid into the strip, with the Kerem Shalom crossing remaining the only entry point for approved cargo to reach the enclave.
It noted that on 1 June, Israeli forces began re-routing humanitarian convoys through a new checkpoint where they have been held up by delays, congestion, malfunctions and slow screening.
Concentration camps
On Tuesday, Israeli media revealed that the Board of Peace is set to launch “Hamas-free humanitarian zones” in Gaza, where Palestinians will be herded while the Israeli military expands its control over the rest of the territory.
Israeli newspaper Israel Hayom reported that the first site will open in Tel Sultan, near Rafah, “within weeks”, and house civilians “with no weapons or affiliation with Hamas”.
It added that the zone will be policed by a “multinational force”, known as the International Stabilisation Force (ISF), which will be equipped with “non-lethal weapons” and operate from the Israeli Amitai Camp near Gaza under the command of the board.
According to the report, aid will be supplied to the zones, but no detail was given on how this will be distributed and by whom.
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