UnitedNations [it/its]

Gaza: UN aid teams reject Israel’s ‘deliberate attempt to weaponize aid’, 2025-05-06
UN warns of growing humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, 2025-05-04

The education of 800 students in occupied East Jerusalem is at risk as Israel moves to close their schools next week, a senior official with the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, said on Wednesday.

“It’s a grave threat to the right of those children to education,” Roland Friedrich, Director of UNRWA Affairs for the West Bank, told UN News.

The development follows two Israeli laws that went into effect in late January which ban UNRWA from operating in its territory and prohibit Israeli authorities from having any contact with the agency.

UNRWA is the largest provider of healthcare, education and other services for nearly six million Palestine refugees across the Middle East, including in war-torn Gaza.

This week the International Court of Justice – the UN’s highest court - began hearings to examine Israel’s restrictions on the work of the UN and other international organizations in Gaza and the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

Mr. Friedrich spoke about how the affected students are anxious over the prospect of being shut out of the classroom. He also underlined UNRWA’s commitment to continue to deliver in East Jerusalem “as long as we can.”

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Roland Friedrich: Roughly four weeks ago we received notifications from the Israeli Ministry of Education that the three schools we operate in Shu’fat refugee camp and another three schools we operate inside East Jerusalem shall be closed.

We have 800 students in these schools and these children have no adequate access to education beyond these schools. This is very concerning for the children, for their families, and it comes while the school year is still ongoing. So, this is unprecedented. It’s a grave threat to the rights of those children to education and it’s very concerning particularly because these closure orders are supposed to come into effect on 8 May, which is less than a week from now.

UN News: What other UNRWA programmes are at risk in the West Bank?

Roland Friedrich: I think we have to make a distinction between our work in occupied East Jerusalem, which according to the Israeli legislation is banned, and our work in the rest of the West Bank where, according to Israel, all our work is not banned.

In East Jerusalem we operate, in addition to the six schools with 800 children, two health centres – one in the Old City and another in Shu’fat refugee camp – with roughly 60,000 patients: vulnerable patients who have no adequate access to other health facilities, patients with non-communicable diseases, patients who have West Bank ID who have no access to alternative health facilities, and low-income patients.

We are also responsible for garbage collection in Shu’fat refugee camp, which is on the Palestinian side of the so-called separation barrier.

In addition to that, we also operate a vocational training centre in the north of Jerusalem, also on the Palestinian side of the barrier, with 350 trainees, all from the West Bank.

Our main headquarters in occupied East Jerusalem is in the Sheikh Jarah neighbourhood. We currently cannot operate from it because of continuing security threats: threats to the safety and security of our staff, ongoing attacks against the compound.

We again had an arson attack against these facilities three weeks ago, and continuous destruction of the fence, of cameras, of security infrastructure with high material damage.

So that’s a place that’s not safe for our staff to work despite the fact that it is a facility protected by the privileges and immunities of the United Nations.

When it comes to the West Bank overall, our operations there largely continue. That means our 90 schools, our 41 health centres, our microfinance installations, continue to operate.

But we do have a severe humanitarian crisis in the northern West Bank due to an ongoing Israeli security forces operation that started in late January and that has led to the displacement of more than 40,000 Palestinian refugees from three refugee camps.

UN News: What messages did you hear from students, parents and teachers during your latest visit to Shu’fat camp? How is the community coping with this uncertainty?

Roland Friedrich: There is anxiety among children. They are worried that they can’t continue the school year, which runs until the end of June. They’re worried that they will be separated from their friends.

They’re worried that they will lose access to education. They are worried that they will have to be placed in education facilities that are maybe very far away or not available at all.

These are free schools, and we teach from grades one to nine. A lot of them are young girls who feel safe there in an appropriate learning environment that they will possibly lose.

Parents are also concerned. UNRWA has been delivering services in that refugee camp since the 1960s, predating Israeli occupation of East Jerusalem, so there’s a history of UNRWA teaching in that place and an appreciation for the quality of the services we deliver.

Given the fact that all international UN staff have not received visas from the Israeli authorities since late January, it’s our local staff on the ground who are taking high risks in continuing to serve their communities.

UN News: In this challenging environment, what steps is UNRWA considering to support the continuity of its services in East Jerusalem?

Roland Friedrich: We’ve been very clear since these laws against UNRWA entered into effect on 29 January. We’ve been seeking to live up to our humanitarian commitment, to our mandate to continue to deliver these services to communities in East Jerusalem.

There have been legal efforts by Israeli civil society organizations before the courts against these laws and against these disclosure orders. Some of these proceedings are still pending.

We clearly call upon all actors to respect the obligations under international law, particularly to respect the inviolability of the premises of the United Nations in East Jerusalem.

We are providing these services based on a mandate by the General Assembly.

UNRWA clearly enjoys full privileges and immunities like any other UN agency, and our staff there are taking grave personal risks.

We are assessing the situation on a daily basis. Is it still safe for our staff to operate or not? As a matter of principle, we will be there as long as we can.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) says that only 5 percent of the nearly $45 billion needed for funding in the humanitarian community this year has been received as of the 6th of March, leaving a gap of more than $42 billion. Reuters reports that OCHA itself is to “cut 20% of its staff as it faces a shortfall of $58 million”, “U.N. aid chief Tom Fletcher told staff” [no publicly available statements found on UN websites with these numbers.]

With the US leaving the World Health Organization, refusing to pay it’s contributions for 2024 and 2025, combined with reductions in funding by some other countries, WHO is expected to face a salary gap for the 2026-27 biennium between US$ 560 and US$ 650 million. Representing at least 25% of staff costs in the current biennium. While other member states have agreed to increase their contributions, increasing the 2026-27 biennium funding by US$ 320, it is too little, and has left the WHO with no choice but to restructure and reduce the scale of their work and workforce. Cutting the senior leadership team from twelve to seven, and departments by over half, from 76 to 34.²

The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has projected “its 2026 budget to shrink by at least 20% compared to 2024”, as reported by Reuters [no publicly available statements found on UN websites with these numbers.]. This years budget is also affected, meaning that “At least 14 million children are expected to face disruptions to nutrition support and services”.

• More than 2.4 million children suffering from severe acute malnutrition could go without Ready-to-use-Therapeutic-Food (RUTF) for the remainder of 2025.
• Up to 2,300 life-saving stabilisation centres – providing critical care for children suffering from severe wasting with medical complications – are at risk of closing or severely scaling back services.
• Almost 28,000 UNICEF-supported outpatient therapeutic centres for the treatment of malnutrition are at risk, and in some cases have already stopped operating."

"Even before the funding cuts, the number of pregnant and breastfeeding women and adolescent girls suffering from acute malnutrition soared from 5.5 million to 6.9 million – or 25 per cent – since 2020. UNICEF expects these figures to rise without urgent action from donors as well as adequate investments from national governments"³

Speaking at the UN on the 21 March, Deputy Executive Director Kitty Palais said:

“Earlier this week, I saw the consequences of the funding crisis firsthand when I visited the Afar region in the north of Ethiopia and Maiduguri in northeast Nigeria. Due to funding gaps in both countries, nearly 1.3 million children under five suffering from severe acute malnutrition could lose access to treatment over the course of the year”
“In Afar, a region that is prone to recurrent drought and floods, I visited a mobile health and nutrition team providing life-saving services to pastoralist communities in remote areas without health clinics. These teams are critical to supporting children with vital assistance, including treatment of severe wasting, vaccinations and essential medicines.
“But, without these critical interventions, children’s lives are in peril. Only 7 of the 30 mobile health and nutrition units that UNICEF supports in Afar are currently operational – and this is a direct result of the global funding crisis.

The World Food Program is expected to cut its staff by up to 30%, as reported by AP [no publicly available statements found on UN websites with these numbers.]. The agency said on March 28th that it was “facing an alarming 40 percent drop in funding for 2025”.

AP also reported that the High Commissioner for Refugees “would downsize its headquarters and regional offices to reduce costs by 30% and cut senior-level positions by 50%” [no publicly available statements found on UN websites with these numbers.]. With the agency saying that it’s “health budget has been cut by 87 per cent”.

A much more insignificant result of the crisis, but much closer to me, the Meetings Coverage and Press Releases has been publishing coverage of UN meetings later, and using machine translation of coverage by the French team.

[1] https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/04/1162751
[2] https://www.who.int/news-room/speeches/item/who-director-general-s-opening-remarks-at-the-member-state-briefing-on-the-programme-budget---22-april-2025
[3] https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/least-14-million-children-face-disruptions-critical-nutrition-services-2025-unicef

In what he described as possibly his last address to the Security Council, the head of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) warned today that “violence has become the defining currency of our age” — from Sudan to Ukraine, from the Sahel to Myanmar and beyond — and urged the 15-member organ to fulfil its responsibility for maintaining peace.

Despite knowing the gravity of the crises, the Council’s inaction itself is “an indictment”, said Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, asserting that the organ has “chronically failed to live up to” its responsibility.

He painted a bleak picture of today’s wars, driven by the “perverse, yet powerful delusion: that peace is for the weak”, where victory is pursued not through negotiation but by inflicting unbearable suffering. As a result, “the norms of international humanitarian law… are cast aside, dismissed as easily as the thousands of lives destroyed in the pursuit of supremacy”. Quoting Pope Francis, he reminded members that “every war represents not only a defeat of politics but also a shameful surrender”.

Highlighting the plight of 123 million forcibly displaced people worldwide, he described their hope for safety and eventual return, noting especially the devastating situation in Sudan, where “one out of every three people” has been displaced. Refugee-receiving countries are doing their part. “You must be more committed and more united to do yours,” he urged.

On Ukraine, he emphasized the need for a “just peace” that would allow more than 10 million displaced Ukrainians to return safely, cautioning that “solutions are hard work” requiring “commitment and compromise”. In Myanmar, he urged breaking eight years of “dangerous inertia” concerning the Rohingya crisis, stressing that while challenges are immense, dialogue with all parties is “a critical first step” towards creating conditions for the safe, voluntary and dignified return of refugees. “It is a long shot, for sure”, he admitted, but insisted that stagnation is no longer an option, urging the Council to sustain its robust focus on the situation in Myanmar.

Referencing the symbolic moment of the new Syrian flag being raised at the UN on 25 April, he said: “For the first time in decades, there is a spark of hope, including for the millions of Syrians who remain displaced today, 4.5 million of them refugees in neighbouring countries.” But achieving lasting solutions will require prioritizing the Syrian people over “long-standing politics, some of which are frankly outdated”.

Finally, he warned against the global trend of retrenching from aid and multilateralism at a critical time for several displacement crises. “Aid is stability,” he declared, noting that by freezing or cutting aid budgets — which means taking support away from very fragile host countries and abandoning displaced people to their fate — “you are undermining your own stability”.

In the discussion that followed, some members warned of the global trend of aid cuts, while others called for more equal burden-sharing.

China’s delegate emphasized that “solving the refugee problem requires strengthening international cooperation”. However, a certain country has drastically cut foreign aid, forcing many humanitarian organizations to reduce their aid activities. “This is undoubtedly a serious blow to refugee relief,” he said, warning that more people would be displaced. He called on developed countries to shoulder their responsibilities by fulfilling their aid commitments and providing more support to refugee-hosting countries and multilateral humanitarian organizations. He also warned against unilateralism and “hegemonic and bullying” behaviour.

The representative of the United States said that “the UN exists for collective action, and collective action demands collective responsibility”. Underscoring the responsibility for every Member State to share the burden of humanitarian response to conflict, she said that “the United States has disproportionately shouldered this burden for decades”.

The representative of the Russian Federation said that Western countries, “who have provoked a lion’s share of conflict throughout the world”, are very reluctant to finance UNHCR’s programmes to assist refugees from Syria, Afghanistan, Sudan and many other conflict-ridden countries.

Pakistan’s delegate, noting that his country has provided shelter, protection and opportunities to millions of Afghans, expressed concern that developing countries — many grappling with their own socioeconomic challenges — continue to shoulder the greatest burden. Meanwhile, developed nations, despite their far greater resources and moral obligations, have increasingly turned inward. “Physical and political barriers have been erected, closing doors to those most in need,” he said.

Several speakers highlighted other factors causing mass displacement, with Guyana’s delegate stating that climate change is also becoming a major driver of such movement. Citing the 2024 global data over the past decade, she said that weather-related disasters have caused 220 million people to be internally displaced. Slovenia’s representative added: “Climate-fuelled floods, fires and prolonged droughts now drive families from their homes as ruthlessly as any gunman or bombs.”

Citing Sudanese women fleeing to Chad, Congolese women in displacement camps around Goma, and Rohingya women and girls in long-term refugee camps in Bangladesh, Sierra Leone’s delegate said that climate-induced disasters further compound their vulnerability and increase the severity of such violence.

Responding to comments and questions by Council members, Mr. Grandi said that “I am leading an internal effort, which may conclude with the retrenchment of my organization to up to one third of its capacity.” There will be fewer offices, fewer programmes and fewer operations, he added, noting that UNHCR — founded in 1950 — will “unfortunately” observe its seventy-fifth anniversary in 2025. “It is not a date to celebrate, but one perhaps on which to reflect on the challenges that we all face, and to try and find some inspiration to address them together,” he concluded.