laws targeting UNRWA<\/a>\u00a0and return its seized assets and property.<\/p>\n\u2018By what law does this happen?\u2019<\/p>\n
Maryam herself sustained minor injuries in the Israeli attack, while five of her children also suffered injuries. Her husband was critically wounded in the neck.<\/p>\n
In April 2024, she left Gaza as a medical companion to her spouse, who was referred for treatment at an Egyptian hospital. She was forced to leave behind the rest of her children in Gaza, including those who were wounded.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt feels like leaving for treatment and escaping death has become a crime we are being punished for,\u201d Maryam told Al Jazeera by phone, her voice breaking with tears.<\/p>\n
\u201cWasn\u2019t it enough that I spent all this time grieving for my injured children, being away from them and constantly worried about them while accompanying my husband in treatment? They added to our wounds by dismissing us from our jobs. By what law does this happen?\u201d<\/p>\n
For Maryam and many others who were displaced outside Gaza during the war, the blow was especially severe, as it followed a February 2025 decision to place them on \u201cexceptional leave\u201d despite the fact that many of them continued teaching remotely.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll my children are injured and have metal plates in their limbs. They suffered immensely after my salary stopped,\u201d said the mother of eight.<\/p>\n
In the past two weeks, the crisis has extended to employees who remain in the Strip, after the agency decided to cut their salaries by 20 percent, a move that has further deepened their humanitarian suffering amid Gaza\u2019s catastrophic conditions.<\/p>\n
The financial shortfall comes amid a decline in international donations, which had long formed the backbone of UNRWA\u2019s budget, particularly after several donor states froze their contributions following Israeli allegations against some of its employees.<\/p>\n
UNRWA provides essential services to millions of Palestinian refugees, who make up about 70 percent of the Gaza population, including education, healthcare, and social assistance, playing a central role in maintaining a minimum level of stability amid repeated Israeli wars and restrictions on crossings.<\/p>\n
![\"Dr](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/873A5243-copy-1769426398.jpg\")
Dr Mustafa al-Ghoul, a dentist with UNRWA for 29 years, who heads the agency\u2019s staff union, is currently leading protests against its recent decisions [Abdelhakim Abu Riash\/Al Jazeera]Why Gaza first?<\/p>\n
There has been widespread anger and protests among UNRWA staff in Gaza, both inside and outside the Strip, who argue that the measures disproportionately target Gaza compared with the agency\u2019s other five areas of operation: the occupied West Bank, Jerusalem, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria.<\/p>\n
Mustafa al-Ghoul, head of the UNRWA staff union in Gaza and a dentist who has worked with the agency for 29 years, questioned why Gaza \u2014 the most devastated and afflicted area \u2014 was chosen as the first sacrifice.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll the measures started in Gaza, as if Gaza is not already overwhelmed by death, destruction, and hunger,\u201d he told Al Jazeera, standing in front of their partially destroyed headquarters in Gaza City.<\/p>\n
Of some of the 600 dismissed Palestinian employees who were outside Gaza, the cutting off of their salaries and savings without prior notice, al-Ghoul said, \u201cSome are sick. Some have cancer. Some were on official leave. Some lost their entire families. Some left to treat a grandchild, and then they are punished with dismissal and deprivation of their rights.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGaza needs someone to heal its wounds. Gaza is dying. You see tents, death, and destruction everywhere. Gaza needs compassion, not dismissals and the drying up of its lifelines,\u201d al-Ghoul appealed to UNRWA\u2019s leadership.<\/p>\n
![\"UNRWA](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/873A4342-copy-1769426332.jpg\")
Jihan al-Harazin with her husband and their three children in their tent west of Gaza City, where they were displaced after their home was destroyed [Abdelhakim Abu Riash\/Al Jazeera]\u2018UNRWA was the backbone of our survival\u2019<\/p>\n
Union warnings about the consequences of UNRWA cuts are already visible in the scarred daily lives of displaced Palestinians in Gaza, particularly in education, healthcare and food security.<\/p>\n
This decline is reflected in the testimony of Jihan al-Harazin, 28, a mother of three, displaced in Gaza City, whose family relied almost entirely on the agency\u2019s services.<\/p>\n
\u201cUNRWA was the backbone of our survival,\u00a0 in health, education, and food. It provided everything,\u201d she told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n
That reality, however, has changed dramatically since the war began.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow, there is nothing,\u201d Jihan said, referring to the food aid that UNRWA has not been able to distribute for months.<\/p>\n
Since October 2023, all humanitarian agencies, particularly the UN egency, have faced persistent obstacles in delivering aid to Gaza.<\/p>\n
On multiple occasions, Lazzarini accused Israel of using humanitarian aid as a political tool. He said Israel is using aid to Gaza \u201cas a weapon\u201d to deepen civilian suffering.<\/p>\n
\u2018A war waged on humanitarian work\u2019 in Gaza<\/p>\n
Amjad Shawa, director of the Palestinian NGOs Network (PNGO) in Gaza, told Al Jazeera that UNRWA represents \u201cthe backbone of humanitarian work in the Palestinian territory\u201d, stressing that its role extends beyond services to the political core of the refugee issue as one of the last pillars of humanitarian and social stability in Gaza.<\/p>\n
\u201cUNRWA carries a central cause for our people, the refugee cause itself. It was established by a UN General Assembly resolution and has operated for decades,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Al-Shawa said the agency is facing \u201ccontinuous Israeli incitement\u201d alongside Israeli bans on its operations in the occupied Palestinian territory, particularly Gaza, and the obstruction of humanitarian aid.<\/p>\n
He warned that weakening UNRWA serves Israel\u2019s agenda to erase the Palestinians\u2019 right of return and compensation. That has been a key goal of the successive Israeli governments.<\/p>\n
Linking the agency\u2019s cuts to a broader campaign against humanitarian work in Gaza, al-Shawa noted Israel has faced global condemnation<\/a> after a ban on dozens of international aid organisations working to provide life-saving assistance to Palestinians in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip came into effect.<\/p>\n\u201cThere is a war being waged against humanitarian work, including UNRWA, and we are paying the price for our commitment to international humanitarian law, a law the Israeli occupation refuses to uphold.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gaza City \u2014 After 18 years as a teacher with an UNRWA-run school, Maryam Shaaban (name changed for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264978,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[50,85,46,44,47,43,48,4498],"class_list":{"0":"post-264977","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-gaza","9":"tag-il","10":"tag-israel","11":"tag-israel-palestine-conflict","12":"tag-middle-east","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-palestine","15":"tag-unrwa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264977\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"INTERACTIVE-GAZA](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1769757069_952_Death-toll-tracker-1769346004.png\"){kind=tracking}
<\/p>\n