UN chief tells Israel that draft law banning UNRWA aid agency in Gaza would be a ‘catastrophe’.

Israel’s draft law to stop the UN’s Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) from working in the Gaza Strip and West Bank would be “catastrophic” if enacted, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Tuesday.

Guterres said he had raised his concerns with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“Such a move would hinder efforts to alleviate human suffering and tension in Gaza, and indeed the rest of Palestine,” he told reporters.

“It would be a tragedy in what is already an unrepentant tragedy.”

Israel’s parliament in July gave preliminary approval to a bill that would declare UNRWA a terrorist organization. Israeli leaders have accused UNRWA staff of collaborating with Hamas terrorists in Gaza.

Responding to Guterres’ comments, Israel’s UN Ambassador Danny Danon told Reuters: “Israel is working with humanitarian organizations that are actually interested in helping people and not activism or, in some cases, terrorism.”

The UN said in August that nine UNRWA workers may have been involved in the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and were fired. Then the commander of Hamas in Lebanon – who was killed last month in an Israeli strike – was found to have worked for UNRWA.

UNRWA provides education, health and aid to millions of Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. There have been tense relations with Israel for a long time but relations have worsened since the start of the war in Gaza and Israel has repeatedly called for UNRWA to be disbanded.

Guterres spoke to reporters one day after a year-long attack by Hamas on Israel, in which about 1,200 people were killed and about 250 captured, according to Israeli figures. More than 100 hostages are still being held in Gaza by the Palestinian terrorist group.

The Secretary General said there is still time to stop the spreading violence.

He also called for an immediate cessation of hostilities in Gaza and Lebanon, the release of all the hostages taken by Hamas on October 7, 2023 in southern Israel and the delivery of aid to help the masses of people who needed it most.

The Hamas attack prompted Israeli retaliation in Gaza, sparking a humanitarian crisis in the besieged area where authorities say nearly 42,000 people have been killed.

“There is something wrong with the way this war is being conducted,” Guterres said on Tuesday.

“Ordering citizens to evacuate does not keep them safe if they have no safe place to go and no shelter, food, medicine and water.”

The conflict in Gaza has raised fears of a regional war, pitting Israel against Iran and the militant groups it supports, including Lebanon’s Hezbollah. The Israeli military on Tuesday deployed more troops in southern Lebanon, signaling an increase in Hezbollah attacks.

Gaza on the ‘wheel of death,’ Guterres said

Guterres called on Israel and Hezbollah to respect the safety and security of UNIFIL peacekeepers in southern Lebanon.

He said Israeli soldiers working near the UNIFIL position – staffed by Irish peacekeepers – left after complaining on Monday to “various bodies.” After that, the UN official said that Guterres is in contact with the United States.

About 2,000 Lebanese have been killed since Hezbollah began shelling Israel last year in collaboration with Hamas, most of whom have been killed in the past few weeks. Guterres said the death toll in Lebanon has already exceeded the number of people killed in the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah.

Guterres said “the Middle East is a powder keg with many factions holding the game,” adding that Lebanon is at risk of “endless war” and Gaza is “facing death.”

The conflict in the Middle East is “getting worse by the hour,” Guterres said, and every airstrike, missile launch and rocket fire “is pushing peace further out of reach and worsening the suffering of millions of civilians caught in the middle.”