January 6, 2023
HOW CANADA CAN LEAD THE PEACE PROCESS IN THE MIDDLE EAST OR CONTINUE ENABLING THE CONFLICT: UNRWA
UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works agency, has been declared by many as the key impediment to peace in the Middle East. Through its schools and camps, UNRWA trains hundreds of thousands of children to want to kill Jews and teaches genocidal Antisemitism.
Founded in 1949, it was supposed to give aid and resettle the approximately 600,000 Arab refugees who left Israel after the 1948 War of Independence. That number has increased to a staggering 6.7 million. The refugee camps have become cities. UNRWA shows no intention to resettle the inhabitants. They are kept as a festering sore – weaponized in the war against Israel. Even those who are citizens in other countries are deemed refugees by the organization.
UNRWA has also weaponized education. In their schools, they have adopted the anti-Israel curriculum of the Palestinian Authority in violation of UN principles of peace and reconciliation.
It is terrifying and heart-wrenching when children are indoctrinated with racist and hateful ideas that encourage violence, specifically against Israel and the Jews. Genocidal Antisemitism is embedded in the curriculum.
Even the European Union Parliament which has been complicit with the PA’s usurpation of land, funding the building of illegal structures in the Jewish area of Judea and Samaria, has condemned their textbooks as” bigoted.” In a resolution passed on December 14, 2022, they denounced the Antisemitism and hatred taught in UNRWA schools as against European values, and as a “key impediment to the resolution of the conflict.”
In July 2022, Hillel Neuer, Director of UN Watch tweeted that his organization has “easily identified 120 UNRWA teachers, principals and other employees who praise Hitler, glorify terrorist attacks and spread Antisemitism. He called the “exploitation of children as child soldiers” a “form of child abuse and a violation of international law.”
The Harper government cut all funding to UNRWA in 2010 because of its close ties with Hamas. The Trump administration cut US funding in 2018 for “lack of accountability”; President Biden has resumed funding but only under the condition their curriculae are geared to peace. Thus funds are held in trust right now.
Our current Canadian government has increased its funding to over $27 million in 2022 and it is expected that and more will be transferred to UNRWA in 2023 with no conditions - not even expectations, demands of changes aligned with Canadian values and morality. This makes Canada complicit in Antisemitism and training terrorists
UNRWA’s influence in the Middle East is gigantic. It has a budget of 1.6 billion US dollars, a staff of 29,000 and operates in six countries. It oversees 59 refugee camps. UNRWA is accountable to none of its donors. It acts with impunity and its Chief Executive has declared it has no intention of changing its policy.
Here is where Canada comes in. As Chair of the Refugee Working Group which still exists on paper since l991, Canada can lead the way to UNRWA policy changes.
David Bedein, an internationally renowned investigative journalist based in Israel, has written about and studied UNRWA for decades. He has drawn up a list of required changes.
Demand an audit of UNRWA’s donor funds. This would address reports of wasted resources, duplicity of services and flow of cash to Gaza based terror groups, which gained control over UNRWA operations in Gaza. Canada slashed funds to UNRWA after Hamas took control of the UNRWA trade union and the UNRWA teachers association in Gaza in 2009. UNRWA in Gaza and Terrorist Organizations A Cooperative Relationship
Introduce UNHCR standards to UNRWA, to advance the resettlement of Arab refugees. UNRWA vs UNHCR Chart Comparison
Cancel the UNRWA curriculum which incorporates principles of Jihad, martyrdom and the right of return by force of arms, in UN schools. Palestinian Authority textbooks and teachers’ guides dealing with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict (based on books published in 2019)
Stop the paramilitary training of UNRWA students targeting Israel.
Remove any UNRWA employee affiliated with Hamas. UNRWA schools in the Gaza Strip a hotbed for Islamic Radicalism
If the Liberal government continues to recklessly throw our money at UNRWA, without demanding transparency and changes in the present policy, it is aiding and abetting terrorism and the hopelessness of countless millions for peace and the prosperity that peace would bring.
Or it could execute its power of leadership and lead the way to peace in the Middle East.
Which will it be?
Doris Strub Epstein, Editor
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End Jew Hatred Canada is the Jewish civil rights movement, fighting for freedom from bigotry, and oppression that denigrates our people, our homeland, our culture. Jew hatred threatens our safety and Canada’s thriving democracy. It comes from all forms of extremism. There is no justice without truth.
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