On 15 March, Foreign Minister Senator Penny Wong announced Australia would resume funding the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), ending the pause in funding consequent to allegations that UNRWA staff actively participated in the barbaric 7 October terrorism in southern Israel.
UNRWA is arguably the very worst of all international agencies. It ticks the boxes of a bloated unaccountable bureaucracy, corrupt leadership, and failure in executing its mission and it demonstrably harms the cause of peace by teaching hatred and inciting terrorism. But worse, it is substantially integrated with Hamas, a proscribed terrorist organisation.
Nearly everyone in the Jewish community in Australia has family and/or friends in Israel. We have been deeply impacted by what happened on 7 October, not only by the horrific attack in Israel but by the explosion of antisemitism in Australia. Giving money to UNRWA is a serious betrayal.
Over many years numerous highly credible organisations presented evidence that UNRWA was inciting hatred and glorifying terrorism. Research agencies have repeatedly exposed problematic educational content, reviewing the textbooks and recording school activities.
A short film produced by the Center for Near East Policy Research exposed numerous examples of children being taught they had a right of return by force of arms and terrorist role play. The Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education showed curriculum textbooks which reject the possibility of peace with Israel. A Palestinian student in fourth grade opens his maths book to count martyrs in Palestinian uprisings based on a photograph of raised coffins at a mass funeral. A reading exercise with the letter ‘h’ for first-graders includes the word shahid (martyr), placed in a list of other words that include hujum (attack) and harab (run away).
Arab human rights activist Bassam Eid stated after talking to children in schools that ‘UNRWA teaches children to blow themselves up’. Indeed, outside some UNRWA schools are posters and paintings of those who have done exactly that, martyrs to jihad glorified as heroes and heroines which the Arab children walk past daily.
Interviews conducted with children leaving UNRWA schools confirm lessons that Jews are evil, that all Israel is ‘Arab land’ and some express a readiness to stab, use a car to run over or become suicide bombers, to kill Jews.
Hamas is formally embedded in UNRWA schools with members holding all eleven places for management of the teachers’ union. The Hamas-affiliated Islamic Bloc (known in Arabic as Al-Kutla Al-Islamiah) maintains religious programs in UNRWA schools; these promote incitement for jihad and opposition to Israel. Representatives of the Kutla operate in the schools, with each group supervised by a counsellor (amir) assigned by Hamas. UNRWA schools serve as recruitment facilities for the Hamas youth paramilitary training camps which are run during school holidays.
Since 7 October, overwhelming additional evidence has been exposed. Independent non-government organisation UN Watch has published a report titled ‘UNRWA’s Terrogram’ which presents content of a Telegram group of 3,000 UNRWA teachers replete with posts celebrating October 7th terrorism, praising murderers and rapists as ‘heroes’ and urging the execution of hostages. The Israel Defense Forces has provided a video of a tunnel below UNRWA headquarters in Gaza which contained Hamas computer servers with electrical cabling connected to the UNRWA supply – yes, UNRWA was providing the electricity to Hamas. UNRWA materials have been found in Hamas tunnels.
On 5 March the IDF announced it had identified over 450 terrorist operatives employed by UNRWA and had shared detailed information with the US and UN.
UNRWA is currently subject to an investigation by the Office of Internal Oversight Services which conducts administrative investigations into allegations of misconduct. This limited inquiry concerns allegations of staff involvement in the 7 October terrorism.
Foreign Minister Wong saw fit to resume giving money to UNRWA even before this inquiry is complete, unlike the US and UK. In Senate Estimates on 8 February, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade admitted under questioning by Senator Claire Chandler that it had sent the full 2023-24 allocation to UNRWA without holding back 20 per cent subject to performance assessment as required by the funding agreement. There does seem to be an enthusiastic haste in shovelling money to UNWRA.
By reinstating UNRWA funding, Australia is not only acting contrary to our closest allies but is now actively undermining Israel’s strategy. On 15 February the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, began the legislative process to ban UNRWA from operating within Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also announced UNRWA will have no role in post-war Gaza.
Wong has previously been praised by Hamas for changing Australia’s diplomatic terminology in referring to Gaza, Judea-Samaria (West Bank) and the eastern side of Jerusalem from ‘disputed territories’ to the pejorative ‘occupied territories’. Perhaps supporting Hamas by restoring UNRWA funding will earn further praise.
The three top leaders of Hamas have a staggering fortune of $11 billion, according to a 7 November report by the New York Post. Ismail Haniyeh, Moussa Abu Marzuk and Khaleed Mashal enjoy luxury in Qatar and the international community is not asking how they accumulated such wealth or pressuring them to assist in Gaza. It seems perverse that Australian taxpayers are called upon to provide aid while Hamas leaders fleece the aid and become billionaires.
Our Australian Labor government is knowingly funding an organisation which for decades has been teaching hatred, antisemitism and glorifying jihadist terrorism. The overwhelming evidence is that UNRWA has been supporting and assisting a proscribed terrorist organisation. We have been indirectly funding murderers, kidnappers and rapists.
It is not an exaggeration to say that funding UNRWA is a policy dripping with blood and Wong has her hands all over it.
While the average Aussie might not have much knowledge of Middle East politics, the vast majority would not support Australian foreign aid going anywhere near terrorism or enriching terror leaders.
So here’s an issue for the Coalition for the next federal election. Rebuke the reckless Labor policy of funding UNRWA and assure the Australian people that under a Coalition government there will a more responsible approach and Australia’s aid will not directly or indirectly fund terrorism.
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Dr David Adler is President of the Australian Jewish Association
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