UNRWA chief condemns Israeli seizure of East Jerusalem training centre

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Christian Saunders tells Al Jazeera raid portion of run to weaken bureau and destruct Palestinian rights.

The caput of the UN bureau for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has condemned an Israeli seizure of its East Jerusalem grooming centre, calling the raid portion of a run designed to weaken the bureau and, successful turn, destruct Palestinian rights.

In comments to Al Jazeera, acting Commissioner-General Christian Saunders connected Wednesday accused Israel of violating UN premises, but insisted that “might doesn’t triumph out” successful resolving the struggle and that the bureau is “not going anywhere”.

Israeli forces raided and seized the Qalandiya Training Centre successful the Kafr Aqab neighbourhood connected Tuesday, expelling UNRWA employees and ordering them not to return.

Five Palestinians were injured by Israeli gunfire adjacent the site, according to the Jerusalem governorate.

Far-right Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir took portion successful the raid and said determination was “no spot for the bureau successful Jerusalem and Israel”. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the evacuation was lawful and carried retired nether authorities passed by Israel.

The takeover of the installation deprives hundreds of young Palestinians of acquisition and violates the protections afforded to UN premises nether planetary law, Saunders said.

“Three 100 and forty young radical are not going to get the education, not going to get the grooming they need,” helium remarked. He lamented that the students – mostly from disadvantaged families – volition present miss retired connected learning the skills to springiness them the “opportunity to pb a afloat and dignified life”.

The Qalandiya centre is portion of UNRWA’s wider web of services for Palestinian refugees. It serves astir 16,000 refugees from Qalandiya exile campy and different parts of the occupied West Bank.

The raid followed the closure of the adjacent Qalandiya checkpoint and a dense Israeli subject deployment successful the area.

Israeli authorities said the property was owned by the Jewish National Fund and has present been allocated to the Jerusalem Municipality for a planned acquisition and assemblage complex. They besides cited Israeli legislation, passed successful October 2024, restricting UNRWA’s activities.

UNRWA rejected the claims and maintained that the centre is simply a United Nations installation protected nether planetary law.

Wider campaign

UNRWA has travel nether terrible unit amid Israel’s genocidal warfare connected Gaza and maltreatment successful the occupied West Bank, with respective workers having been killed.

Saunders said the wider run against UNRWA is intended to weaken the bureau and chopped its funding, and links these efforts to the broader question of Palestinian exile rights.

“If UNRWA is defunded and UNRWA is eliminated past they are hoping that the contented of the refugees, the Palestine refugees, volition spell away,” Saunders said. “Which means that the close of return, reparations, and compensation would spell away, arsenic well.”

The assistance radical main pointed retired that its mandate comes straight from the United Nations General Assembly and its relation is to supply humanitarian and nationalist services portion the wider governmental quality betwixt Israel and Palestinians remains unresolved.

“We’re a humanitarian organisation; we’re a improvement organisation. We are fixed our mandate by the United Nations General Assembly to supply captious services,” Saunders said.

UNRWA volition proceed doing truthful “until the General Assembly decides otherwise, oregon determination is simply a durable solution to the Palestine question,” helium declared.

However, Saunders besides acknowledged the limits of the UN’s quality to forestall further incursions without corporate enactment from subordinate states.

“I don’t deliberation the United Nations has the powerfulness to say: ‘You know, this is not going to proceed to happen,’” helium said.

“The United Nations is the sum of its subordinate states, and its subordinate states request to person the corporate determination to code this issue. And for implicit 7 decades, this has not happened.”