By Sam Metz
Associated Press
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli forces on Tuesday targeted at least two United Nations facilities, pushing forward with a crackdown against the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees tasked with delivering humanitarian services to millions of people across the region.
Crews began bulldozing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency ‘s offices in Sheikh Jarrah and fired tear gas at a vocational school in Qalandia, marking Israel’s latest and most dramatic step against UNRWA.
Israel has long railed against the agency, accusing it of being infiltrated by Hamas and saying that some of its employees were involved in the October 2023 attack that triggered Israel’s two-year war in Gaza. UNRWA leaders have said they took swift action against the employees accused of taking part in the attack, and have denied allegations that the agency tolerates or collaborates with Hamas.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday condemned Israel’s destruction of the agency’s compound and called for it to be returned to the U.N.’s control.
“The Secretary-General views as wholly unacceptable the continued escalatory actions against UNRWA, which are inconsistent with Israel’s clear obligations under international law,” said Farhan Haq, the deputy U.N. spokesperson.
Roland Friedrich, the agency’s West Bank director, said UNRWA received word that demolition crews and police arrived at their east Jerusalem headquarters early on Tuesday. Staff have not operated out of the facility for almost a year out of safety concerns, but Israeli forces confiscated devices and forced out private security guards protecting the facility.
“What we saw today is the culmination of two years of incitement and measures against UNRWA in east Jerusalem,” Friedrich said.
He said forces also began firing tear gas outside the vocational school on the outskirts of Jerusalem on Tuesday afternoon before ultimately leaving. More than 300 young refugees receive job training in technology and welding there.
Some children on their way home from the school were overcome by the tear gas and a 15-year-old was hit in the eye with a rubber bullet, according to the Palestinian Authority’s Jerusalem governorate, which monitors Palestinian affairs in the area.
Israeli leaders celebrate demolition
Israel’s Foreign Ministry said the demolition enforced a new law banning UNRWA, noting that Israel owns the site and rejecting UNRWA’s claims that the move violated international law.
Israel has long claimed the agency has an anti-Israel bias. Often with little evidence, it says UNRWA employs and maintains ties with militant groups including Hamas. The U.N. has ardently denied such claims and UNRWA has said it acts quickly to purge any suspected militants among its staff.
UNRWA’s mandate is to provide aid and services to some 2.5 million Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, as well as 3 million more refugees in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon. The group has for years maintained infrastructure in refugee camps and also run schools and provided health care. But its operations were curtailed last year when Israel’s Knesset passed legislation severing ties and banning it from functioning in what it defines as Israel — including east Jerusalem.
The agency said the demolitions could imperil operations at the vocational center in Qalandia and heath facility in Shu’afat, where it still provides education and health services.
An Israeli flag was seen hoisted above the facility in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, where some Israeli politicians arrived on the scene to celebrate the organization’s fate. National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir called it “a historic day.”
‘This must be a wake-up call’
The demolition marked the culmination of years of criticism from Israel and its leaders. Since the start of the Israel-Hamas war more than two years ago, it has ramped up such attacks, saying the militants used UNRWA facilities and seized aid. It has provided little evidence for the claims, which the U.N. has denied. The International Court of Justice said in October that Israel must allow the agency to provide humanitarian assistance in Gaza.
Since Israel passed its law banning the agency last year, its facilities — schools and health centers — and its headquarters have repeatedly been closed, raided or left unprotected.
“This must be a wake-up call,” Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA’s commissioner-general, said in a statement on X. “What happens today to UNRWA will happen tomorrow to any other international organisation or diplomatic mission, whether in the Occupied Palestinian Territory or anywhere around the world.”
More aid groups in Gaza face pressure
Israel’s ban on UNRWA dovetailed with broader efforts to deregister aid groups operating in Gaza and the occupied West Bank. Israel has passed laws requiring nongovernmental organizations not to hire staff involved in activities that “delegitimize Israel” or support boycotts, demanding they register lists of names as a condition of being allowed to work.
Israel told dozens of groups — including Doctors Without Borders and CARE — that their licenses would expire at the end of 2025. The organizations say the rules are arbitrary and warned that the new ban would harm people desperately in need of humanitarian aid.
Settler violence in the West Bank rose last year
The Israeli military said Tuesday that attacks carried out by Jewish settlers against Palestinians and Israeli security forces in the West Bank increased by 27% last year compared with 2024.
There were 867 reports of “nationalistic crimes” — with the number of severe incidents up by more than 50%, according to internal statistics from the Israeli military and the country’s Shin Bet domestic security service.
Mounting settler violence in the West Bank has emptied villages since the war between Israel and Hamas erupted, according to B’Tselem, an Israeli rights group helping the residents.
The Israeli military has carried out large-scale operations in the West Bank targeting militants that have killed hundreds of Palestinians. There also has been a rise in Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
Israeli authorities have a mixed relationship with settlers, at times dismantling unauthorized outposts while also deploying forces to protect them from Palestinians.
Julia Frankel and Shlomo Mor in Jerusalem and Edith M. Lederer and Farnoush Amiri in New York contributed reporting. Find more of AP’s coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war