UN agency for Palestinians must close, says Israeli PM

JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for the closure of the UN Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) as his forces conducted more air strikes in Gaza amid diplomatic efforts for a ceasefire and release of hostages in the enclave.

Israel has accused some UNRWA staff of involvement in the October 7 Hamas assault in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.

Donors including the United States have paused funding pending an investigation, but aid agencies say ending UNRWA operations would wreck humanitarian efforts in devastated Gaza.

The Palestinians have accused Israel of falsifying information to tarnish UNRWA, which was set up to help refugees of the war at Israel’s founding in 1948 and to which more than half Gaza’s population look to for day-to-day assistance.

“It’s time the international community and the UN itself understand that UNRWA’s mission has to end,” Netanyahu told visiting UN delegates, according to his office. He said UNRWA should be replaced by other aid agencies “if we are going to solve the problem of Gaza as we intend to do”.

Earlier, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described UNRWA as “the backbone of all humanitarian response in Gaza” and appealed to all countries to “guarantee the continuity of UNRWA’s life-saving work”.

In Gaza, witnesses said Israel had stepped up air strikes on Gaza City, in the north, and bombarded parts of Khan Younis, in the south, despite what appeared to be the most serious peace initiative for months in the Israel-Hamas war.

Hamas is currently studying the proposal, which envisages the release of all remaining hostages. Israel says they number around 136. Hamas has demanded an end to Israel’s offensive.

World powers hope to prevent a wider conflict, but tensions in the Middle East remain high after Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi rebels said they would keep attacking U.S. and British warships in the Red Sea in solidarity with Palestinians.

Relations between Tehran and Washington are also tense after the deaths of three U.S. soldiers in a drone strike in Jordan that U.S. officials blame on Iran-backed militants. Washington has not yet outlined its response, but Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Wednesday they would respond to any U.S. threat.

Much of the densely populated Gaza Strip has been devastated by almost four months of Israeli bombardment, and most of its 2.3 million residents have been uprooted by fighting. Gaza health authorities said 26,900 Palestinians had been killed.

A senior Hamas official said the Gaza ceasefire proposal involved a three-stage truce, during which Hamas would release the remaining civilians among hostages, soldiers, and finally the bodies of dead hostages.

The proposal followed talks in Paris involving intelligence chiefs from Israel, the US and Egypt, with the prime minister of Qatar.

The US ambassador to the United Nations urged Hamas to accept the proposal, saying it would allow more vital food, water and medicine supplies to enter Gaza.

“(Hamas) can continue to dig tunnels, to plan for its next attack, to use civilians and civilian infrastructure as human shields, or it can lay down its weapons and accept the proposal on the table to release every hostage,” Linda Thomas-Greenfield told a meeting of the UN Security Council.