United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East/Hamas

"We are not convinced that Canada used the information that we provided in a way that would put UNRWA in a different light than before. It's as if nothing happened."

"Even if we got the message that Canada believes UNRWA needs to be reformed, our conviction is that UNRWA needs to be reformed immediately and completely."

"As an organization, it's become a bottleneck that's part of the problem, not the solution."

Iddo Moed, Israeli Ambassador to Canada

"For years I've had meetings in western capitals."

"I've been to Ottawa and met with Canadian officials in Israel many times, and I tell them, 'You get to feel very good about  yourself, even very smug for giving money to supposedly the poor Palestinians, but what you're really funding is the continuation and perpetuation of the century-long Palestinian war against the Jewish state."

Einat Wilf, Israeli politician former member of Knesset

United Nations and Red Crescent workers prepare aid for distribution to Palestinians at the UNRWA warehouse in Deir Al-Balah, Gaza Strip on Monday, Oct. 23, 2023. (Hassan Eslaiah/The Associated Press)

 

Among the evidence that Israel made available to its allies, including Canada, were (a) biographies of employees of the United Nations who participated in the massacre in southern Israel of that infamous October 7 day of barbaric slaughter. (b) Also provided were satellite photographs of schools in Gaza that had been built over buried terrorist bunkers. (c) Proof that Hamas rocket launchers were installed within mere metres of marked United Nations compounds.

Canada was given access to a wide range of Israeli intelligence, before the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau decided it would continue to fund the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, after initially declaring a 'pause' in funding of the agency, in the immediate aftermath of the October 7 assault.  A wide assortment of other donor nations mostly suspended funding until the conclusion of a UN investigation either cleared or confirmed implication of UNRWA.

Canada is not alone in deciding to resume funding rather than wait for the results of the investigation into UNRWA's involvement in the Hamas savagery in southern Israel that resulted in mass rape, the slaughter of over 1,200 infants, children, women, the elderly and the hostage-taking of an estimated 240 Israelis. Japan, Australia, Finland and Sweden also decided to resume their funding. 

A Palestinian boy holds a Hamas flag as he protests against a UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) funding gap, outside the UNRWA Gaza headquarters in Gaza City. Photo by Khalil Hamra

Canada's government, before its decision to resume funding, was given verifiable intelligence that Hamas views UNRWA as part of its civil rule in that it provides the material civic support and infrastructure to Palestinians in Gaza, leaving Hamas free to focus on its military terrorist programs. That briefing clarified that "Hamas is deeply and systemically embedded in UNRWA. Hamas members serve in all sectors of UNRWA activities, including key positions."

The United Nations has supported Palestinians as refugees for the past 76 years. Essentially the funding supporting the Palestinians serves to facilitate ongoing attacks against Israel, as they have since the Jewish state's re-establishment in 1948. According to the Israeli UNRWA dossier up to 2,135 UNRWA employees are members of Palestinian terror groups with over three-quarters of those employees Hamas operatives. Of that number, 327 serve in Hamas's 'military wing', the Al-Qassam Brigades.

Also included in the dossier were over a dozen biographies of UNRWA employees who had taken part in the October 7 attack; an UNRWA social worker seen on surveillance video removing the body of a man from Kibbutz Beeri; an UNRWA school principal who moonlights in the Al-Qassam Brigades among them. The school principal closed his school just prior to the attacks, notifying fellow Hamas operatives to muster close to the Gaza border. Eighteen UNRWA school principals are identified as Hamas combat operatives.

 

It is well known and documented that Hamas makes use of its civilian population as human shields, places rocket launchers, command posts and other strategic targets among and within schools, mosques and hospitals. At least 32 UNRWA facilities located within 20 metres of Hamas installations in Gaza were revealed by Israeli intelligence. Under the UNRWA-operated Maghazi Prep School B in central Gaza a tunnel was discovered, as well as a bunker underneath the UNRWA-run Zaitoun Prep School, both of whose principals are Hamas operatives.

Throughout the Gaza Strip, maps show arms warehouses, tunnel access points and logistical centres adjacent to UN-run schools, residences and facilities. A satellite image depicted construction of an underground bunker in 2010; an updated image taken in 2023 showed an UNRWA school built over the bunker. Hamas rocket launchers near Rafah were placed metres from a mosque and schools as well as throughout UN refugee camps nearby. 

"We have built the tunnels because we have no other way of protecting ourselves from being targeted and killed", explained Mousa Abu Marzouk, deputy chair of the Hamas Political Bureau in an interview with Russia Today, emphasizing that the Gaza tunnels were designed not to benefit Palestinian civilians from return Israeli fire when rockets are launched into Israel, but to protect Hamas 'fighters' and their infrastructure from the Israeli counterattacks, where Hamas is happy to sacrifice their citizens as 'martyrs'.

Activists and their children hold a giant Palestinian flag during a protest demanding that countries resume funding of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinians Refugees (UNRWA) near the European Union headquarters in Beirut, Lebanon on Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2024. (Bilal Hussein/Associated Press)

"While we gathered intelligence on Hamas, more and more links to UNRWA came up."

"The problem is that Hamas infiltrated into the ranks of UNRWA in a systematic manner, in a way that Hamas perceived UNRWA as a strategic asset."

"If UNRWA will not recognize that there is a problem, it will be impossible to fix it. Because the infiltration is so wide, we believe it is beyond repair, and we don't want to see the continuation of the activity of UNRWA in the Gaza Strip."

"Not all of the humanitarian aid reached the civilians, Hamas was trying to use this aid for its own purposes [intercepting and seizing humanitarian aid entering Gaza from international donors]."

Senior Israeli diplomatic source