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Several Western countries have suspended aid to the UNWRA, a move criticized by Palestinians and senior UN officials.
Here’s how things are going on Sunday January 28, 2024:
UNWRA funding
- Several countries, including the United States, are reviewing funding for the Palestinian refugee agency, UNRWA, after Israel claimed some of its employees were involved in the October 7 Hamas attacks .
- Senior Palestinian officials and Hamas criticized the decision to cut funding by nearly a dozen Western countries.
- Cutting UNRWA funding could “violate” the Genocide Convention, UNRWA director Philippe Lazzarini has said. “The Palestinians in Gaza did not need this additional collective punishment,” he wrote on X. “It defiles us all.”
- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres pledged on Sunday to hold “any UN employee involved in acts of terrorism” accountable. But he implored donor states to “guarantee the continuity” of UNRWA operations. “The tens of thousands of men and women who work for UNRWA, many of whom find themselves in some of the most dangerous situations for aid workers, should not be penalized. The urgent needs of the desperate populations they serve must be met,” he said.
- Ireland and Norway said they would continue to fund the agency.
Humanitarian situation
- Thousands of people fleeing fighting in Khan Younis have arrived in Rafah, where people are sleeping on the streets or in tent camps flooded with sewage.
- “Tanks are shooting at everyone,” Ahmed al-Moghrabi, a plastic surgeon at Nasser Hospital, told Tel Aviv Tribune, as Israel’s siege of Khan Younis hospital continues for the fifth day.
- The toll reached 26,257 Palestinians killed and 64,797 others injured.
Diplomacy
- Israel would suspend the war for two months as part of a deal to release 100 captives, the AP and New York Times report, citing unnamed U.S. officials.
- CIA Director Bill Burns is expected to discuss the contours of the emerging deal when he meets Sunday in France with Israeli intelligence agency Mossad David Barnea, Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, and Egyptian intelligence chief Abbas Kamel for discussions. focused on captive negotiations.
- Meanwhile, US national security adviser Jake Sullivan has pressed China to persuade Iran to end its support for attacks on Houthi ships in the Red Sea.
Other developments
- Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said there would be an Israeli military administration in Gaza.
- Families of prisoners held in Gaza gathered again in Tel Aviv, following anti-government protests earlier in the night.
- Pro-Palestinian protesters gathered outside the home of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken for a second night.
- Pope Francis has renewed his call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
- Israel will no longer allow protesters to block trucks carrying humanitarian aid through the Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom) crossing following the ICJ’s ruling that aid must be allowed to enter Gaza, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, citing Israeli security officials.
- Israeli forces arrested nine Palestinians in overnight raids in Hebron and Beita, south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank, Wafa reported.
