On the occasion of the sixth annual Brussels Conference on Syria, the Commissioner-General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, met EUROPE to take stock of the situation currently facing his agency.
UNRWA helps millions of Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the West Bank – including East Jerusalem – Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. In 2021, the agency gave 1.7 million Palestinian refugees access to healthcare services and its schools welcomed 539,000 children. The agency also provides financial and food support to the poorest Palestinian refugees (interview by Camille-Cerise Gessant)
Agence Europe - Are you concerned that the war in Ukraine will overshadow the situation for Palestinian refugees?
Philippe Lazzarini - It is a predominant concern in the region. Before the war in Ukraine, Palestinian refugees already felt abandoned by the international community. This is a feeling they have now had for several years, owing to various factors. One of these factors is that their needs have increased sharply as a result of multiple crises, as have their expectations of UNRWA. But they have also seen that the agency fights day in, day out to provide its services. This means that any let-up is seen as evidence that the international community is no longer paying them the same attention as it once did.
Obviously, the war in Ukraine and all the attention on it are now reinforcing that feeling. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is necessarily no longer getting the same amount of attention, or is not the priority it was just 10 years ago. This feeds into the fear that the conflict and the fate of Palestine are no longer being dealt with as the priority issue they once were. This feeling is very strong, no doubt about it.
Are you already seeing the impact of rising food prices as a result of the war in Ukraine on Palestinian refugees?
There is an impact in the region, particularly in countries with high dependency on these imports, such as Lebanon and Syria. But it is also apparent in Gaza and, to an extent, the West Bank.
The people we are helping are indeed fighting much harder for access to these food supplies. This, in turn, increases the number of people who will be depending on us.
We have already seen an effect with some of our suppliers, not all of whom are going to be able to deliver on contracts negotiated previously and who want to re-negotiate their costs with. This, therefore, affects our operating costs.
Furthermore, due to the focus on the consequences of the war in Ukraine, some donors have told us that they are going to have to delay their contributions, but as we depend so greatly on cash, any delay has consequences. Some donors have told us that there might not be any extensions at the end of the year. And if we cannot have access to these extensions, this will certainly have serious knock-on effects on the organisation. But that hasn’t happened yet. It is just a concern.
UNRWA always has financing issues. The agency struggles to close its budget every year. Why is this the case and how can the problem be resolved?
There has been talk of UNRWA’s financial difficulties for many years. In reality, these problems simply become worse year on year.
UNRWA has been given a mandate by the international community to provide government services – education, primary health care and social protection – to one of the poorest communities of the region, Palestinian refugees. But the funding base is that of an NGO, using voluntary contributions.
As a model, this worked very well for decades, when a group of donors funded its services. For the last 15 years or so, the (Israeli-Palestinian: Ed) conflict started to move down the ranking of priorities. This means that the resources made available to UNRWA started to level off, while costs and needs have continued to rise. And as the conflict has been de-prioritised, we have seen that certain donors felt that they could finally start to justify withdrawing funding from UNRWA.
The model that worked very well up to now is no longer working as well as it once did. There is always the expectation for us to provide these government services.
What can be done?
If there is political will and political support and a continued desire for the agency to go on fulfilling the same mandate, then it must be assured that its resources are adequate to the political expectations on it.
What are we talking? A shortfall of 60 to 100 million dollars a year to pay for these activities, which represent the backbone of what UNRWA does in the region. I remain firmly convinced that this shortfall is a tiny investment to make in relation to the risks of suddenly seeing the agency in a situation in which it can no longer continue to deliver (these services: Ed).
There has to be real political intention and political will if the agency is to be able to continue to invest in the human development of Palestinian refugees in a predictable manner.
It is in our collective interests to have a predictable agency, rather than nobody knowing whether or not it is going to be able to maintain its schools and healthcare centres in such a volatile region as the Near East.
The European Commission has made several calls for UNRWA to be reformed. Is this underway?
I believe that the organisation is constantly being reorganised. Many efforts have been made to improve the various internal control bodies, issues of viability, accountability, transparency. This is an agency that is regularly assessed by external partners (…). No doubt about it, UNRWA is one of the organisations with the best quality/price ratio.
The EU and its member states are major UNRWA donors. How can we build upon this cooperation even more?
It is true that the European Commission and the member states represent the majority of the contributions and support to UNRWA: 60% (of the budget, Ed) (...). The EU is extremely important in this regard.
What we value most is not only this financial support and the strategic cooperation we have with the member states and the European Community, but also the political cooperation we enjoy in terms of promoting and defending the organisation’s mandate.
The European Commission is blocking funds for the Palestinian Authority amid problems with schoolbooks. Is this having repercussions for UNWRA or on the ground?
There are no direct repercussions, because this is really a bilateral issue between the Commission and the Palestinian Authority.
That having been said, any delay in the payment of these contributions ultimately has an effect on the ability of the Palestinian Authority to maintain vital public services for its own population. I really hope that this issue can be resolved as quickly as possible. The longer it goes on, the more of a negative impact it will have.
There has been much debate and many questions have been raised on the educational material, in terms of the curriculum. UNRWA always uses the curricula of the States in which it is active, but we have also developed a single human rights curriculum in the region and have trained our teaching team to promote critical thinking in our schools.