This month, I will conclude my service as the commissioner-general of UNRWA, the United Nations agency that has provided essential public services to Palestinian refugees across the Middle East for over 75 years. As the world struggles to emerge from the crisis in Gaza, and as tensions between the U.S., Israel, and Iran threaten to engulf the region, I am deeply concerned for the future of Palestinian refugees and for the multilateral system as a whole.
After enduring more than two years of relentless physical, political, and legal attacks—most intensely in Palestine—UNRWA has reached a breaking point. The threats to Palestinian rights and regional stability are immense.
In December 2023, as the war in Gaza grew increasingly brutal, I wrote to the president of the UN General Assembly that in my 35 years working in complex emergencies, I had never before reported the killing of 130 staff members, nor anticipated so many more deaths. I could not have imagined then that the number of colleagues killed would triple—now exceeding 390—or that so many others would suffer life-altering injuries, arbitrary detention, and torture.
Hundreds of UNRWA facilities in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed. The Israeli parliament passed legislation to end the agency’s presence in occupied East Jerusalem, including by forcibly closing schools and health clinics and cutting off water and electricity to our premises. UNRWA’s headquarters in East Jerusalem was seized, looted, and set on fire, with senior Israeli officials publicly celebrating the destruction. A deputy mayor of Jerusalem even threatened to “annihilate and kill all members of UNRWA.”
It is unacceptable that a UN agency has been allowed to be dismantled in this way, in violation of international law, with complete impunity, while staff and Palestinian communities pay an unbearable price.
A coordinated disinformation campaign by the Israeli government falsely accuses UNRWA of widespread neutrality violations and claims the agency is no longer operational in Palestine, where it remains a primary provider of healthcare, education, clean water, sanitation, and hygiene. These malicious claims, repeatedly disproven, aim to undermine international support for UNRWA and weaken Palestinian rights in final status negotiations.
UNRWA does not have a political mandate. However, its registration of refugees and archives documenting their displacement are fundamental to safeguarding Palestinian rights in any final resolution. This is precisely why dismantling the agency became an explicit goal of the war in Gaza, and why efforts to achieve this continue.
This week, I wrote again to the president of the UN General Assembly, urging member states to utilize UNRWA’s workforce and expertise as key assets in implementing Security Council Resolution 2803. Doing so would avoid repeating the catastrophic error of dismantling Iraq’s entire civil administration in 2003, which devastated prospects for recovery and lasting peace.
Beyond Gaza, UNRWA is essential for protecting the rights of Palestinian refugees across the region and addressing the long-standing question of Palestine. Yet without immediate and substantial political and financial support, the agency will soon cease to be viable. A disorderly collapse of UNRWA would fuel instability, shift full responsibility for serving Palestinian refugees onto Israel as the occupying power, and place an enormous burden on host countries like Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan. The suffering of Palestinian refugees, who have endured generations of displacement and hardship, would only deepen.
It is shocking that despite UNRWA’s vital role, the agency has not been adequately protected.The international community has failed to protect UNRWA. Instead, the agency has been turned into a proxy battleground in the Israel-Palestine conflict, treated as guilty until proven innocent. While those who ordered and carried out shameful actions against UNRWA bear the greatest responsibility, everyone who claims to support international law must also examine their own role.
The UN was founded to “save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.” Today, as we witness the human suffering in Palestine, Israel, and beyond, achieving the goals of the UN Charter demands moral clarity and principled leadership.
The utter failure to mount an effective, multilateral, and law-based response in Gaza has allowed a war to proceed outside the bounds of international law—a conflict that is now spreading across and beyond the Middle East. This failure has normalized contempt for the rules-based international order.
UNRWA may soon cease to exist, with devastating consequences not only for millions of refugees but for regional peace and stability, and for the rights-based international framework we have worked so hard to build. We must act—not later, but now—to mobilize a broad coalition determined to uphold international law and defend multilateralism.
Philippe Lazzarini is commissioner-general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
Frequently Asked Questions
Frequently Asked Questions Israel Dismantling UNRWA Operations in Gaza
BeginnerLevel Questions
1 What is UNRWA and what does it do in Gaza
UNRWA is a UN agency created in 1949 In Gaza it provides essential services like running schools and health clinics distributing food aid and offering social services to a large portion of the population who are registered as refugees
2 What does it mean that Israel has dismantled UNRWAs operations
It means the Israeli government has taken steps to severely restrict or stop UNRWA from functioning in Gaza This includes denying its staff access blocking aid shipments closing its facilities and declaring it will no longer recognize UNRWA as the primary aid agency in the territory
3 Why would Israel do this
The Israeli government has long accused UNRWA of perpetuating the refugee issue and has alleged that some UNRWA staff members have links to militant groups like Hamas It views dismantling UNRWA as a necessary step to change the governance and aid structure in postwar Gaza
4 If UNRWA is dismantled who will help people in Gaza
This is a major point of concern Israel has suggested that other international aid organizations or a new yettobecreated entity could take over However there is currently no organization with UNRWAs scale infrastructure or staff inside Gaza to immediately replace it creating a dangerous aid vacuum
5 What does the international community has stood by mean
It means that despite many countries expressing deep concern or condemning the move no powerful group of nations has taken decisive concrete actionsuch as imposing serious consequences or deploying an alternative aid mechanismto stop or reverse the situation
AdvancedLevel Questions
6 What are the immediate humanitarian risks of dismantling UNRWA
The immediate risks are severe a collapse of the food distribution system leading to famine the shutdown of healthcare for millions the halt of education for over 300000 students and the spread of disease due to a breakdown in sanitation services It threatens a catastrophic worsening of the already dire humanitarian crisis
