United Nations Relief and Works Agency For Palestine Refugees in The Near East - Relations With Israel

Relations With Israel

After Israel captured the West Bank and Gaza in the June 1967 Six-Day War, Israel requested that the UNRWA continue its operations there, and agreed to facilitate them. In the years since, relations between Israel and UNRWA have found themselves subject to the varying intensities of conflict that have continued to rock the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. During the Al-Aqsa Intifada, which started in late 2000, UNRWA often complained that Israeli road closures, curfews and checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza have interfered with its ability to carry out its humanitarian mandate. The Agency has also complained that large scale house demolitions in the Gaza Strip have left over 30,000 people homeless. Israel justifies the demolitions as anti-terrorism measures.

Relations between UNRWA and Israel have often been strained. UNRWA has been under routine attack from the Israeli government and politicians for alleged involvement with Palestinian militant groups, such as Hamas. For example, the Israel Defence Force released a video from May 2004, in which armed Palestinian militants carry an injured colleague into an UNRWA ambulance, before boarding with him. The ambulance driver requested that the armed men leave, but was threatened and told to drive to a hospital. UNRWA issued a plea to all parties to respect the neutrality of its ambulances.

On other occasions, UNRWA buildings have been caught in battles between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian militants resulting in the deaths of several employees.

In November 2002 Iain Hook, a British employee of UNRWA, was shot and killed by an Israeli military sniper while working in the Jenin refugee camp, during an operation to locate a Palestinian militant suspected of masterminding a suicide bombing which had killed 14 people earlier in 2002. Peter Hansen, the head of UNRWA at the time criticized the killing: "Israeli snipers had sights. They would have known who the two internationals (non-Palestinians) were. They did not dress like Palestinians."