DANNY DANON: UN abdicates role of Middle East peacemaker by backing terrorists
Danny Danon, Israel's permanent representative to the United Nations, writes that the global body has sided with terrorists and forfeited any ability it may have had to forge peace in the Middle East
This week, heads of state converged on Turtle Bay for the UN’s annual high-level week. If there ever were an occasion for the world’s diplomatic juggernauts to collectively solve the world’s most pressing geopolitical quagmires, this would be it.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is correct that this is a once-in-a- generation opportunity to address the world’s challenges and "reform outdated international institutions." One of those outdated institutions we must talk about is UNRWA in Gaza.
ISRAEL'S UN AMBASSADOR SLAMS WORLD BODY, SAYS UNRWA TAKEN OVER BY TERRORISTS IN GAZA
When it comes to Israel, the UN isn’t interested in easing tensions on Israel’s northern and southern borders as much as it is in rewarding terrorism and demonizing the Jewish State. For standing up for itself. For defending its people in a war on seven fronts, orchestrated by the Islamic Republic of Iran, a Shiite supremacist empire hellbent on achieving regional dominance, not diplomacy.
Tehran’s proxies — Hezbollah in the north, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen, Shiite militias in Iraq and Syria, and terrorist cells in Judea and Samaria are Tehran’s attack dogs, unleashed to sow death and chaos across the Middle East.
The Palestinian resolution approved by the General Assembly last week — demanding that Israel end its "unlawful presence in the Palestinian territories" while calling for sanctions and an arms embargo against Israel — demonstrates why the United Nations offers little hope for advancing regional peace. The resolution was nothing short of diplomatic terrorism, designed to sabotage real peace efforts by shifting attention away from condemning Hamas for triggering this 11-month war.
Rather than focusing on condemning Hamas for perpetrating the single greatest massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust, the UN circus has once again adhered to what has now become a predictable, virulently anti-Israel script.
Peace is hard to come by while the UN remains loath to come to terms with the sinister reality that one of its agencies, UNRWA in Gaza, has been overrun by Hamas terrorists. For that reason, and for the sake of peace for Israelis and for Gazans, UNRWA must be disbanded.
UNRWA’s stated mission is to advance the human development of Palestine through the achievement of five strategic outcomes, centered on protecting refugee rights under international law; safeguarding their health; providing education to school-aged children; offering sufficient opportunities for earning a living; and providing Gazans with basic food and shelter provisions.
But since its founding in 1949, UNRWA has failed miserably in achieving these goals. UNRWA has failed to ameliorate the lives of Gazans, and it has failed to prevent Hamas terrorists from hijacking the agency’s operations in Gaza.
How is UNRWA safeguarding the health of Gazans or providing high-quality education opportunities when it is overrun by terrorists who use schools not to educate but as Hamas command and control centers?
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The preponderance of evidence pointing to terrorism at UNRWA has done little to convince the UN. On Aug. 5, the UN conceded that nine UNRWA employees likely took part in the Hamas butchering of 1,200 people, which included more than 30 Americans, on Oct. 7.
Earlier this month, more local UNRWA workers were found to have been disguised as Hamas operatives. On a moral and professional level, UNRWA has failed Palestinians, it has failed Israel, and it has failed the UN.
It is time to deploy a new agency in Gaza that is focused more on humanitarian efforts, and not on activism or, in some cases, terrorism. The latest polio campaign, spearheaded by UNICEF, the World Health Organization and IDF, where more than 600,000 Gazan children were vaccinated, shows that progress is possible when Israel is working with partners interested in humanitarian efforts.
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