As Israel prepares to escalate its military campaign on the southern Gaza city of Rafah, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield told that Israel has an obligation to keep civilians safe, and that under current conditions, a planned military operation there “cannot proceed.”
The flow of humanitarian assistance continues to lag far behind the needs of the nearly 1.5 million Palestinians who have taken shelter in Rafah.
Meanwhile, the primary agency delivering aid on the ground, UNRWA, continues to be embroiled in scandal.
On Saturday, the Israeli military said it found a network of Hamas tunnels under the agency’s Gaza headquarters. The commissioner general of UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, said the agency was unaware of what was underneath the building and that the allegations “merit an independent inquiry.”
The beleaguered organization faces a crisis of funding, as top donor nations, including the United States, have moved to suspend their funding. This came in response to accusations leveled by Israel in late January that 12 UNRWA employees had direct involvement in the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, which killed some 1,200 people in Israel.
