U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres defended the UNRWA’s operations in Gaza on Sunday, saying only “a few elements” of the organization were affiliated with Hamas.
Israeli ambassador to the U.N. Danny Danon claimed last week that the UNRWA, or United Nations Relief and Works Agency, is completely taken over by Hamas. Guterres has admitted that Hamas “infiltrated” the organization, but said during a Sunday appearance on CNN that there is no evidence behind Israel’s claims.
“The fact is there was an infiltration with a few elements that indeed participated in the 7th of October,” Guterres said, condemning the action.
“A lot of things have been invented that do not correspond at all to the truth,” he continued. “Of course there are tunnels below the premises of UNRWA, as there are tunnels everywhere in Gaza. But there has never been any commitment of UNRWA in general to provide any kind of support to Hamas.”
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United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres has rejected claims that Hamas has influence over UNRWA in Gaza. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura, File)
Meanwhile, Israel has doubled down on its accusations regarding UNRWA. Danon accused Guterres and the U.N. of “burying its head in the sand” on the issue. Danon himself was defending an Israeli airstrike that hit the UNRWA al-Jaouni school in a Gaza refugee camp last week.
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“Those who were killed in the IDF strike were nine terrorists with blood on their hands, and some of them participated in the barbaric massacre on October 7. In case there are still any doubts, there are the names of the Hamas terrorists who were at the school compound disguised as ‘local UNRWA employees,'” he Danon said.
The school, which was not operational, was being used as a Hamas command and control center, according to the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).
Photos released by the Israeli Defense Force show three individuals that the Israeli military claims are Hamas combatants inside the UNRWA compound in Rafah. (IDF)
Just last month, Fox News Digital reported that UNRWA was forced to fire nine employees because of their likely involvement in Hamas’s slaughter of nearly 1,200 people on Oct. 7 in southern Israel.
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The U.S. suspended funding to UNRWA because of the role some of its employees played in the Oct. 7 massacre. President Biden had initially restarted aid to the controversy-hit agency upon assuming office after former President Trump’s decision to defund the organization in 2018.
Fox News’ Benjamin Weinthal contributed to this report
