The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the main United Nations agency providing aid to Palestinians in Gaza, is facing growing administrative hurdles from Israel, with a shipment amounting to a month's supply of food blocked in port, the agency's chief said.
Israel has alleged that 12 staff members with UNRWA were involved in the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, with a number of donor countries suspending funding. UNRWA has dismissed staff accused of involvement in the attack and launched an investigation.
"We have an environment here which is for the time being quite hostile to the agency but there have been some decisions now which are starting to impact the ability of the agency to properly operate," UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said on Friday.
He said UNRWA had been informed by a contractor that provided handling services in the port of Ashdod that it could no longer continue working with UNRWA, following instructions from the Israeli authorities.
As a result, a shipment from Turkey consisting of 1,049 containers of supplies, including flour, chickpeas, sugar, and cooking oil, enough to cover the needs of 1.1 million people for a month, was blocked in the port, Lazzarini said.
He said UNRWA had informed Turkey of the stoppage. There was no immediate comment from Turkish authorities.
A spokesperson for the finance ministry said the matter was in the hands of the government's legal advisor but offered no further comment.
Canceling tax breaks previously offered to UNRWA
Last week, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich announced on social media platform X that Israel was canceling tax breaks previously offered to UNRWA. The decision was not formally communicated to the agency, which only learned about it when the statement appeared on the platform, Lazzarini said.
UNRWA was established to help Palestinian refugees who were forced from their homes or fled during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war when the armies of the surrounding Arab nations invaded and attempted to destroy the nascent State of Israel.
It still distributes aid and provides education to their descendants in Gaza, the West Bank, and east Jerusalem, as well as Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria.
Israel has long accused it of contributing to the conflict by fostering Palestinian terror groups, and the accusations have ratcheted up sharply since the Oct. 7 attack.
On Sunday, the IDF announced it had discovered a tunnel running under the agency's Gaza headquarters. It additionally found evidence that UNRWA electric infrastructure was providing power to the tunnel. During a raid of the headquarters, the IDF published evidence attesting to its statement that it had found weapons inside the offices of the building.
Jerusalem Post Staff contributed to this report