Israel needs to pay for damage to Gaza facilities, UN says

Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon said it was “unacceptable” that the organization should make demands for compensation from Israel, and not from Hamas.

By TOVAH LAZAROFF, HERB KEINON
Updated: MARCH 27, 2018 11:37
Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon speaks at the UNGA (photo credit: Courtesy)
Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon speaks at the UNGA
(photo credit: Courtesy)
United Nations has demanded that Israel pay compensation for damage done to seven of its Gaza facilities by the IDF during the 2014 war between Israel and Hamas.
“On 22 March, the UN submitted to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel a claim for reimbursement for the losses that the UN had sustained in seven incidents in 2014,” UN spokesman Farhan Haq told The Jerusalem Post in response to an email query.
The UN “also submitted a claim for the losses sustained by the dependents of one of its staff members who was killed in one of the incidents,” Haq said.
A UN board of inquiry looked “into the matter found that the seven incidents in which UN premises were hit were all attributable to the IDF,” he said, adding that the board had finished its work in February 2015.
Israel’s Mission to the UN in New York said it had received a demand for $528,725 for the facilities and $64,449 for the death.
The question of compensation had been a bone of contention between Israel and the UN when the board of inquiry examined the incidents, particularly because Israel has claimed that Hamas hid weapons in weapons in UN facilities and attacked its force from or near those facilities.
The facilities had also served as emergency shelters for Palestinians in Gaza during the war and as such, were supposed to be immune from IDF shelling.
Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon said it was “unacceptable” that the organization should make demands for compensation from Israel, and not from Hamas.
“Everyone knows our intention was to protect our citizens, and not harm anyone else, while Hamas uses UN facilities to hide behind,” Danon told the Post, noting the terrorist tunnels built underneath UN schools.
“The blame should go on Hamas,” he said.
Danon added that the country just recently received the UN request and that he plans to speak to the relevant authorities and present Israel’s position.