Fiji opening an embassy in Jerusalem last month in defiance of United Nations resolutions on Occupied Palestine and hosting a visit by a senior Israeli minister from the paraiah state this week has revived condemnation by Pacific human rights groups and Palestinian advocates.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel visited the Philippines, Papua New Guinea and Fiji — where she welcomed a possible “peacekeeping” role — in a week-long Pacific friendship mission.

She also faced controversy in New Zealand over the trip.

Both Fiji and Papua New Guinea have opened controversial embassies in Jerusalem, recognised as the capital of Palestine when statehood is granted.

The NGO Coalition on Human Rights in Fiji has condemned Fiji’s coalition government for “callously ignoring the unfolding famine and mass starvation in Gaza”, saying it was being “deliberately orchestrated” by Israel in a statement.

The statement was issued before the opening of the embassy and the declaration of a Gaza ceasefire brokered by President Donald Trump and three mediating Middle East countries.

While Israel has violated the fragile ceasefire several times in the past two weeks, killing at least 100 Palestinians, the International Court of Justice has made a nonbinding ruling that Israel must support UN relief efforts in Gaza, including those conducted by the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).

Embassy entourage
The NGOCHR statement by chair Shamima Ali, dated September 9, criticised widespread reports in Fiji media that Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka would take “an entourage of 17 government officials and spouses” to officially establish the residential Fijian embassy.

“The coalition government appears to be callously ignoring the unfolding famine and mass starvation in Gaza that is being deliberately orchestrated by the state of Israel,” she said.

“This very same Fiji government previously defended the destruction, killing, and maiming of scores of thousands of innocent civilians — 70 percent of them women and children — by Israel at the International Court of Justice [in an earlier and ongoing case on genocide].”

Shamima Ali highlighted the visit in August by two World Elders — Mary Robinson (former President of Ireland and former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights) and Helen Clark (former Prime Minister of Aotearoa New Zealand and former Head of UNDP) — to the Rafah crossing into Gaza from Egypt.

They had witnessed how Israel was preventing the flow of food, water, and medicine to the suffering people of Gaza, and declared it as an “unfolding genocide” — “this is not the chaos of war, nor the result of an environmental disaster. It is intentional.”

Ali said Prime Minster Rabuka, and ministers Lynda Tabuya and Pio Tikoduadua had made “rather unconvincing arguments” about opening of the Fijian embassy in Jerusalem on September 18 amid the unfolding genocide in Gaza.

“Whether they like it or not, in the eyes of the world, Fiji will be seen as a country that supports the apartheid and pariah state of Israel, and its genocide in Gaza,” the statement said.

‘Not in our name’
Ali said the NGOCHR reiterated its “Not in our name” opposition to Fiji’s defence of Israel at the ICJ in a case brought by South Africa accusing Israel of committing genocide.

It also declared its strongest “Not in our name” opposition to the establishment of the Fiji Embassy in Jerusalem.

“Neither action reflects the wishes of all citizens of Fiji. It does not reflect well on Fiji for the present coalition government to be effectively supporting Israel’s genocide in Palestine.”

Members of the Fiji NGO Coalition on Human Rights are Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre (chair), Fiji Women’s Rights Movement, Citizens’ Constitutional Forum, femLINKpacific, Social Empowerment and Education Program, and Diverse Voices and Action (DIVA) for Equality Fiji.

Pacific Network on Globalisation (PANG) is an observer.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

When I despairingly contemplate the horrors and cruelty that Palestinians in Gaza are being subjected to, I sometimes try to put this in the context of where I live.

I live on the Kāpiti Coast in the lower North Island of Aotearoa New Zealand.

Geographically it is around the same size as Gaza. Both have coastlines running their full lengths. But, whereas the population of Gaza is a cramped two million, Kāpiti’s is a mere 56,000.

I find it incomprehensible to visualise what it would be like if what is presently happening in Gaza occurred here.

The only similarities between them are coastlines and land mass. One is an outdoor prison while the other’s outdoors is peaceful.

New Zealand and Palestine state recognition
Currently Palestine has observer status at the United Nations General Assembly. In May last year, the Assembly voted overwhelmingly in favour of Palestine being granted full membership of the United Nations.

To its credit, New Zealand was among 143 countries that supported the resolution. Nine, including the United States as the strongest backer of Israeli genocide  outside Israel, voted against.

However, despite this massive majority, such is the undemocratic structure of the UN that it only requires US opposition in the Security Council to veto the democratic vote.

Notwithstanding New Zealand’s support for Palestine broadening its role in the General Assembly and its support for the two-state solution, the government does not officially recognise Palestine.

While its position on recognition is consistent with that of the genocide-supporting United States, it is inconsistent with the over 75 percent of UN member states who, in March 2025, recognised Palestine as a sovereign state (by 147 of the 193 member states).

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s government does have the opportunity to correct this obscenity as Palestine recognition will soon be voted on again by the General Assembly.

In this context it is helpful to put the Hamas-led attack on Israel in its full historical perspective and to consider the reasons justifying the Israeli genocide that followed.

7 October 2023 and genocide justification
The origin of the horrific genocide of Palestinians in Gaza and the associated increased persecution, including killings, of Palestinians in the Israeli occupied West Bank (of the River Jordan) was not the attack by Hamas and several other militant Palestinian groups on 7 October 2023.

This attack was on a small Israeli town less than 2 km north of the border. An estimated 1,195 Israelis and visitors were killed.

The genocidal response of the Israeli government that followed this attack can only be justified by three factors:

1. The Judaism or ancient Jewishness of Palestine in Biblical times overrides the much larger Palestinian population in Mandate Palestine prior to formation of Israel in 1948;
2. The right of Israelis to self-determination overrides the right of Palestinians to self-determination; and
3. The value of Israeli lives overrides the value Palestinian lives.

The first factor is the key. The second and third factors are consequential. In order to better appreciate their context, it is first necessary to understand the Nakba.

Understanding the Nakba
Rather than the October 2023 attack, the origin of the subsequent genocide goes back more than 70 years to the collective trauma of Palestinians caused by what they call the Nakba (the Disaster).

The foundation year of the Nakba was in 1948, but this was a central feature of the ethnic cleansing that was kicked off between 1947 and 1949.

During this period  Zionist military forces attacked major Palestinian cities and destroyed some 530 villages. About 15,000 Palestinians were killed in a series of mass atrocities, including dozens of massacres.

During the Nakba in 1948, approximately half of Palestine’s predominantly Arab population, or around 750,000 people, were expelled from their homes or forced to flee. Initially this was  through Zionist paramilitaries.

After the establishment of the State of Israel in May this repression was picked up by its military. Massacres, biological warfare (by poisoning village wells) and either complete destruction or depopulation of Palestinian-majority towns, villages, and urban neighbourhoods (which were then given Hebrew names) followed

By the end of the Nakba, 78 percent of the total land area of the former Mandatory Palestine was controlled by Israel.

Genocide to speed up ethnic cleansing
Ethnic cleansing was unsuccessfully pursued, with the support of the United Kingdom and France, in the Suez Canal crisis of 1956. More successful was the Six Day War of 1967,  which included the military and political occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.

Throughout this period ethnic cleansing was not characterised by genocide. That is, it was not the deliberate and systematic killing or persecution of a large number of people from a particular national or ethnic group with the aim of destroying them.

In fact, the acceptance of a two-state solution (Israel and Palestine) under the ill-fated Oslo Accords in 1993 and 1995 put a temporary constraint on the expansion of ethnic cleansing.

Since its creation in 1948, Israel, along with South Africa the same year (until 1994), has been an apartheid state.   I discussed this in an earlier Political Bytes post (15 March 2025), When apartheid met Zionism.

However, while sharing the racism, discrimination, brutal violence, repression and massacres inherent in apartheid, it was not characterised by genocide in South Africa; nor was it in Israel for most of its existence until the current escalation of ethnic cleansing in Gaza.

Following 7 October 2023, genocide has become the dominant tool in the ethnic cleansing tool kit. More recently this has included accelerating starvation and the bombing of tents of Gaza Palestinians.

The magnitude of this genocide is discussed further below.

The Biblical claim
Zionism is a movement that sought to establish a Jewish nation in Palestine. It was established as a political organisation as late as 1897. It was only some time after this that Zionism became the most influential ideology among Jews generally.

Despite its prevalence, however, there are many Jews who oppose Zionism and play leading roles in the international protests against the genocide in Gaza.

Based on Zionist ideology, the justification for replacing Mandate Palestine with the state of Israel rests on a Biblical argument for the right of Jews to retake their “homeland”. This justification goes back to the time of that charismatic carpenter and prophet Jesus Christ.

The population of Palestine in Jesus’ day was about 500,000 to 600,000 (a little bigger than both greater Wellington and similar to that of Jerusalem today). About 18,000 of these residents were clergy, priests and Levites (a distinct male group within Jewish communities).

Jerusalem itself in biblical times, with a population of 55,000, was a diverse city and pilgrimage centre. It was also home to numerous Diaspora Jewish communities.

In fact, during the 7th century BC at least eight nations were settled within Palestine. In addition to Judaeans, they included Arameans, Samaritans, Phoenicians and Philistines.

A breakdown based on religious faiths (Jews, Christians and Muslims) provides a useful insight into how Palestine has evolved since the time of Jesus. Jews were the majority until the 4th century AD.

By the fifth century they had been supplanted by Christians and then from the 12th century to 1947 Muslims were the largest group. As earlier as the 12th century Arabic had become the dominant language. It should be noted that many Christians were Arabs.

Adding to this evolving diversity of ethnicity is the fact that during this time Palestine had been ruled by four empires — Roman, Persian, Ottoman and British.

Prior to 1948 the population of the region known as Mandate Palestine approximately corresponded to the combined Israel and Palestine today. Throughout its history it has varied in both size and ethnic composition.

The Ottoman census of 1878 provides an indicative demographic profile of its three districts that approximated what became Mandatory Palestine after the end of World War 1.

In 1882, the Ottoman Empire revealed that the estimated 24,000 Jews in Palestine represented just 0.3 percent of the world’s Jewish population.

The self-determination claim
Based on religion the estimated population of Palestine in 1922 was 78 percent Muslim, 11 percent Jewish, and 10 percent Christian.

By 1945 this composition had changed to 58 percent Muslim, 33 percent Jewish and 8 percent Christian. The reason for this shift was the success of the Zionist campaigning for Jews to migrate to Palestine which was accelerated by the Jewish holocaust.

By 15 May 1948, the total population of the state of Israel was 805,900, of which 649,600 (80.6 percent) were Jews with Palestinians being 156,000 (19.4 percent). This turnaround was primarily due to the devastating impact of the Nakba.

Today Israel’s population is over 9.5 million of which over 77 percent are Jewish and more than 20 percent are Palestinian. The latter’s absolute growth is attributable to Israel’s subsequent geographic expansion, particularly in 1967, and a higher birth rate.

The current population of the Palestinian Territories, including Gaza, is more than 5.5 million. Compare this with the following brief sample of much smaller self-determination countries —  Slovenia (2.2 million), Timor-Leste (1.4 million), and Tonga (104,000).

The population size of the Palestinian Territories is more than half that of Israel. Closer to home it is a little higher than New Zealand.

The only reason why Palestinians continue to be denied the right to self-determination is the Zionist ideological claim linked to the biblical time of Jesus Christ and its consequential strategy of ethnic cleansing.

If it was not for the opposition of the United States, then this right would not have been denied. It has been this opposition that has enabled Israel’s strategy.

Comparative value of Palestinian lives
The use of genocide as the latest means of achieving ethnic cleansing highlights how Palestinian lives are valued compared with Israeli lives.

While not of the same magnitude appropriated comparisons have been made with the horrific ethnic cleansing of Jews through the means of the holocaust by Nazi Germany during the Second World War. Per capita the scale of the magnitude gap is reduced considerably.

Since October 2023, according to the Gaza Health Ministry (and confirmed by the World Health Organisation) more than 54,000 Palestinians have been killed. Of those killed over 16,500 were children. Compare this with less than 2000 Israelis killed.

Further, at least 310 UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency) team members have been killed along with over 200 journalists and media workers. Add to this around 1400 healthcare workers including doctors and nurses.

What also can’t be forgotten is the increasing Israeli ethnic cleansing on the occupied West Bank. Around 950 Palestinians, including around 200 children, have also been killed during this same period.

Time for New Zealand to recognise Palestine
The above discussion is in the context of the three justifications for supporting the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians strategy that goes back to 1948 and which, since October 2023, is being accelerated by genocide.

• First, it requires the conviction that the theology of Judaism in Palestine in the biblical times following the birth of Jesus Christ trumps both the significantly changing demography from the 5th century at least to the mid-20th century and the numerical predominance of Arabs in Mandate Palestine;
• Second, and consequentially, it requires the conviction that while Israelis are entitled to self-determination, Palestinians are not; and
• Finally, it requires that Israeli lives are much more valuable than Palestinian lives. In fact, the latter have no value at all.

Unless the government, including Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters, shares these convictions (especially the “here and now” second and third) then it should do the right thing first by unequivocally saying so, and then by recognising the right of Palestine to be an independent state.

Ian Powell is a progressive health, labour market and political “no-frills” forensic commentator in New Zealand. A former senior doctors union leader for more than 30 years, he blogs at Second Opinion and Political Bytes, where this article was first published. Republished with the author’s permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The chief of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees has described Gaza as “no land” for children, as two rallies were held in New Zealand’s largest city Auckland today to mark Palestine Children’s Day.

Citing the UN agency for children UNICEF, Phillipe Lazzarini said that “at least 100 children are reported killed or injured every day in Gaza” since Israel broke the truce with Hamas on March 18.

“The ceasefire at the beginning of the year gave Gaza’s children a chance to survive and be children,” said Lazzarini, who is Commissioner-General of UNRWA.

“The resumption of the war is again robbing them of their childhood. The war has turned Gaza into a ‘no land’ for children. This is a stain on our common humanity.

Harrowing.
At least 100 children are reported killed or injured every day in #Gaza, since the strikes resumed (on 18 March) according to @UNICEF

Young lives cut short in a war not of children’s making.

Since the war began 1.5 years ago, 15,000 children were reportedly…

— Philippe Lazzarini (@UNLazzarini) April 4, 2025

The two Auckland Palestinian solidarity events today marking April 5 — one a children’s activities gathering in Albert Park and the other a regular weekly rally at “Palestine Corner” in downtown Te Komititanga Square — were among 25 activist happenings across the country on week 78 of continuous protests.

In Albert Park, one of the organisers said the children “had lots of fun — painting, drawing, listening to stories, making collages, playing games with Palestinian themes and some families had picnics.”

In “Palestine Corner”, several teachers spoke of the realities of the genocide in Gaza, protesters carried placards with photos and names of children killed by the Israeli bombing, while children coloured pictures and blew bubbles.

Huge toll on children
Reporting from Deir el-Balah, Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum reports that children have been among the most severely affected by the continuing Israeli war on Gaza.

“Many of them have been killed, injured and orphaned and we can see that thousands of children have lost their limbs and they are suffering from severe trauma,” he said.

“As the UNRWA spokesperson stated: 51 percent of Gaza’s population are children and they make up the largest proportion of those that were killed since the war began back on October 7, 2023.

“For many children here in Gaza, displacement has taken a very heavy, huge toll on them.

“They have been repeatedly displaced, forced to flee their homes and right now they are forced to live in overcrowded shelters and tents and on the rubble of their destroyed homes and residential buildings.”

The Palestinian Human Rights Organisations Council (PHROC) — made up of nine groups — has written to UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk to demand action on Israel in protest over the killing of children.

Israeli forces continued to kill Palestinians on a genocidal scale in Gaza and had created “conditions of life unfit for human survival,” the council told Turk.

Israel’s “intent to eliminate and eventually destroy Palestinians across unlawfully occupied Palestine” is also evident in occupied West Bank, the council said.

The council called on Turk to clearly label Israel’s conduct as genocide, pressure the Israeli government to end its genocide, ensure accountability for Israeli perpetrators, and mobilise the UN to implement a plan to end genocide against Palestinians across the occupied territory.

Albanese’s mandate renewed
Meanwhile, Francesca Albanese will continue to serve as Special Rapporteur until 30 April 2028, a spokesperson for the UN Human Rights Council announced after the vote today in Geneva by the UNHRC to retain her.

The UN Human Rights Council defied the efforts of Israel, the US, The Netherlands and other Western countries trying to unseat Albanese, who has been special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories occupied since 1967 for the past three years.

Albanese had faced a smear campaign for many months by deniers of Israel’s genocide against Palestinians, which she had warned about in October 2023.

She documented the crimes against humanity, notably in her devastating report Anatomy Of A Genocide in April 2024.

The influence of the West is crumbling. Francesca Albanese‘s mandate has been renewed – as it is usual procedure – despite heavy pressure from Western Zionist genocidal lobby ❤️‍🔥 the tables are turning 🔥 pic.twitter.com/vULovc3bVn

— Melanie Schweizer 🇩🇪 (@Melaniebelizi) April 5, 2025

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The United Nations tasked with providing humanitarian aid to the besieged people of Gaza — and the only one that can do it on a large scale — says it is ready to provide assistance in the wake of the ceasefire tomorrow but is worried about the impact of being “outlawed” by Israel.

A spokesperson, Tamara Alrifai, for the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) said: “We’re extremely eager to see the humanitarian part of the ceasefire, actioned as of tomorrow morning.”

However, Alrifai also told Al Jazeera that UNRWA was “extremely worried” that if UNRWA was prevented from being able to work “then the glue that brings together the entire complex humanitarian operation might not be able to function”.

In October, Israel passed a law banning UNRWA from operating on Israeli territory and areas under Israel’s control. The ban is set to take effect next month.

Alrifai said UNRWA was continuing to work in Gaza, with UNRWA staff managing shelters and distributing food.

“Not only is UNRWA the backbone of the humanitarian response with our shelters, our people, our personnel, our trucks and our warehouses . . .  but the minute the ceasefire kicks in, it is of utmost priority to bring over 600,000 children back to some form of learning,” she added.

Another aid agency, Doctors Without Borders (MSF), said that while the ceasefire deal was a “relief”, it was coming too late and political leaders had “failed” the people of Gaza.

“Searching for bodies’
“For more than 15 months, hospital rooms have been filled with patients with severed limbs and other life-altering trauma, caused by strikes, and distressed people searching for the bodies of their family members,” MSF said in a statement.

The agency, which said eight of its workers had been killed since the start of the war, described humanitarian needs in the besieged and bombarded territory as having reached “catastrophic levels”.

“The Israeli government, Hamas, and world leaders have tragically failed the people of Gaza, by not agreeing and imposing a sustained ceasefire sooner,” it said.

“The relief that this ceasefire brings is far from enough for people to rebuild their lives, reclaim their dignity and to mourn for those killed and all that’s been lost.”

Meanwhile, the Health Ministry in Gaza has released its latest daily casualties update from Israeli attacks, indicating that the number of people killed since the start of the war had risen by 23 to 46,899 in the latest 24-hour reporting period.

Another 83 people were wounded over the same period, bringing the total to 110,725.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The United Nations General Assembly has voted overwhelmingly to demand an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip — but three of the isolated nine countries that voted against are Pacific island states, including Papua New Guinea.

The assembly passed a resolution yesterday demanding an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, which was adopted with 158 votes in favour from the 193-member assembly and nine votes against with 13 abstentions.

Of the nine countries voting against, the three Pacific nations that sided with Israel and its relentless backer United States were joined by Nauru, Papua New Guinea and Tonga.

The other countries that voted against were Argentina, Czechia, Hungary and Paraguay.

Thirteen abstentions included Fiji, which had previously controversially voted with Israel, Micronesia, Palau. Supporters of the resolution in the Pacific region included Australia, New Zealand, and Timor-Leste.

#BREAKING
UN General Assembly ADOPTS resolution A/ES-10/L.33 demanding an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza as well as the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages

VOTE:
In favor: 158
Against: 9
Abstain: 13 pic.twitter.com/ijOnemfKL7

— UN News (@UN_News_Centre) December 11, 2024

In a separate vote, 159 UNGA members voted in favour of a resolution affirming the body’s “full support” for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.

UNRWA has been the target of diplomatic and financial attacks by Israel and its backers — which have baselessly accused the lifesaving organisation of being a “terrorist group” — and literal attacks by Israeli forces, who have killed more than 250 of the agency’s personnel.

Nine UNGA members opposed the measure — including Nauru, Papua New Guinea and Tonga — while 11 others abstained. Security Council resolutions are legally binding, while General Assembly resolutions are not, and are also not subject to vetoes.

#BREAKING
UN General Assembly ADOPTS resolution A/ES-10/L.32 affirming its full support for the mandate of the UN Relief and Works Agency @UNRWA and deploring the legislation adopted by the Israeli Knesset on 28 October 2024

VOTE:
In favor: 159
Against: 9
Abstain: 11 pic.twitter.com/KTlsA8V86k

— UN News (@UN_News_Centre) December 11, 2024

The US has six times vetoed Security Council resolutions in favour of a ceasefire in the past 14 months.

The UN votes yesterday took place amid sustained Israeli attacks on Gaza including a strike on a home sheltering forcibly displaced Palestinians in Deir al-Balah that killed at least 33 people, including children, local medical officials said.

This followed earlier Israeli attacks, including the Monday night bombing of the al-Kahlout family home in Beit Hanoun that killed or wounded dozens of Palestinians and reportedly wiped the family from the civil registry.

“We are witnessing a massive loss of life,” said Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia, reports Common Dreams.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

New Zealand will make its annual payment of $1 million to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) as scheduled.

Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters has confirmed the news in a tweet.

“This follows careful consideration of the UN’s response — including through external and internal investigations — to serious allegations against certain UNRWA staff being involved in the 7 October terrorist attacks on Israel,” he said.

“It also reflects assurances received from the UN Secretary-General about remedial work underway to enhance UNRWA’s neutrality.”

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon in January confirmed New Zealand would hold off on making the usual June payment until Peters was satisfied over accusations against the agency’s staff.

UNRWA is the UN’s largest aid agency operating in Gaza, but in January Israel levelled allegations that a dozen of UNRWA’s staff had been involved in the October 7 attack by Hamas fighters into southern Israel.

The attack left about 1139 people dead and about 250 Israeli soldiers and civilians were reported to have been taken hostage.

Never suspended
Speaking from Fiji on the final day of his trip to the Pacific, Luxon said New Zealand had never suspended its payments as other countries had.

“Our funding is made once a year. It was due by the end of June. As I said at the time, they were serious allegations. The UN investigated then, the deputy prime minister and Foreign Minister Winston Peters also got assurances from the UN Secretary-General.

“We’re reassured that it’s a good investment and it’s entirely appropriate that we now make that payment.”

The independent report commissioned by the UN into the agency concluded it needed to improve its neutrality, vetting and transparency, but Israel had failed to back up the claims which led many countries to halt their funding.

UNRWA fired the 10 employees accused by Israel who were still alive. The agency is one of the largest UN operations and employs about 30,000 people.

Secretary-General António Guterres said any UN employee found to have been involved in acts of terror would be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution.

Luxon said he was “absolutely” satisfied due diligence had been done on the matter, and New Zealand was “very comfortable” making the payments.

New Zealand will be making its annual payment of $1 million to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) on schedule and in coming days. This follows careful consideration of the UN’s response – including through external & internal investigations – to serious…

— Winston Peters (@NewZealandMFA) June 6, 2024

$17m in other aid
“Remember also that we’ve made $17 million worth of additional investments in aid to organisations like the World Food Programme, International Red Cross and others.

“This is just part of our humanitarian assistance package, we’ve woken up this morning to more images of catastrophic impact of civilians in Gaza, why we’ve been calling consistently for some time a cessation of hostilities there.”

Gaza’s Health Ministry estimates at least 36,580 people have been killed in Gaza since the attack in October.

Most recently an Israeli air strike on a UN school in central Gaza, which was packed with hundreds of displaced people, killed more than 40 people.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Good slogans have people nodding their heads in agreement because they recognise an underlying truth in the words.  

I have a worn-out t-shirt which carries the slogan, “The first casualty of war is truth — the rest are mostly civilians”.

If you find yourself nodding in agreement it’s possibly because you have found it deeply shocking to find this slogan validated repeatedly in almost eight months of Israel’s war on Gaza.

The mainstream news sources which bring us the “truth” are strongly Eurocentric. Virtually all the reporting in our mainstream media comes via three American or European news agencies — AP, Reuters and the BBC — or from major US or UK based newspapers such as The Daily Telegraph, The Times, The Washington Post or The New York Times. 

This reporting centres on Israeli narratives, Israeli reasoning, Israeli explanations and Israeli justifications for what they are doing to Palestinians. Israeli spokespeople are front and centre and quoted extensively and directly.

Palestinian voices, when they are covered, are usually at the margins. On television in particular Palestinians are most often portrayed as the incoherent victims of overwhelming grief.

In the mainstream media Israel’s perverted lies dominate. 

Riddled with examples
The last seven months is riddled with examples. Just two days after the October 7 attack on Israel, pro-Palestinian protesters were accused of chanting “Gas the Jews” outside the Sydney Opera House.

The story was carried around the world through mainstream media as a nasty anti-semitic slur on Palestinians and their supporters. Four months later, after an intensive investigation New South Wales police concluded it never happened. The words were never chanted.

However the Radio New Zealand website today still carries a Reuters report saying “A rally outside the Sydney Opera House two days after the Hamas attack had ignited heated debate after a small group were filmed chanting “Gas the Jews”.

Even if RNZ did the right thing and removed the report now the old adage is true: “A lie is halfway around the world before the truth has got its trousers on”. Four months later and the police report is not news but the damage has been done as the pro-Israel lobby intended.

The same tactic has been used at protests on US university campuses. A couple of weeks ago at Northeastern University a pro-Israel counter protester was caught on video shouting “Kill the Jews” in an apparent attempt to provoke police into breaking up the pro-Palestine protest.

The university ordered the protest to be closed down saying “the action was taken after some protesters resorted to virulent antisemitic slurs, including ‘Kill the Jews’”. The nastiest of lies told for the nastiest of reasons — protecting a state committing genocide.

Similarly, unverified claims of “beheaded babies” raced around the world after the October 7 attack on Israel and were even repeated by US President Joe Biden. They were false.

No baby beheaded
Even the Israeli military confirmed no baby was beheaded and yet despite this bare-faced disinformation the Israeli ambassador to New Zealand was able to repeat the lie, along with several others, in a recent TVNZ interview on Q&A without being challenged.

War propaganda such as this is deliberate and designed to ramp up anger and soften us up to accept war and the most savage brutality and blatant war crimes against the Palestinian people.

Recall for a moment the lurid claims from 1990 that Iraqi soldiers had removed babies from incubators in Kuwaiti hospitals and left them to die on the floor. It was false but helped the US convince the public that war against Iraq was justified.

Twelve years later the US and UK were peddling false claims about Iraq having “weapons of mass destruction” to successfully pressure other countries to join their war on Iraq.

Perhaps the most cynical misinformation to come out of the war on Gaza so far appeared in the hours following the finding of the International Court of Justice that South Africa had presented a plausible case that Israel was committing genocide.

Israel smartly released a short report claiming 12 employees of UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency) had taken part in the October 7 attack on Gaza. The distraction was spectacularly successful.

Western media fell over themselves to highlight the report and bury the ICJ findings with most Western countries, New Zealand included, stopping or suspending funding for the UN agency.

Independent probe
eedless to say an independent investigation out a couple of weeks ago shows Israel has failed to support its claims about UNRWA staff involved in the October 7 attacks. It doesn’t need forensic analysis to tell us Israel released this fact-free report to divert attention from their war crimes which have now killed over 36,000 Palestinians — the majority being women and children.

The problem goes deeper than manufactured stories. For many Western journalists the problem starts not with what they see and hear but with what their news editors allow them to say.

A leaked memo to New York Times journalists covering the war tells them they are to restrict the use of the terms “genocide” and “ethnic cleansing” and to avoid using the phrase “occupied territory” when describing Palestinian land.

They have even been instructed not to use the word Palestine “except in very rare cases” or the term “refugee camps” to describe areas of Gaza settled by Palestinian refugees driven off their land by Israeli armed militias in the Nakba of 1947–49.

These reporting restrictions are a blatant denial of Palestinian history and cut across accurate descriptions under international law which recognises Palestinians as refugees and the occupied Palestinian territories as precisely what they are — under military occupation by Israel.

People reading articles on Gaza from The New York Times have no idea the story has been “shaped” for us with a pro-Israel bias.

These restrictions on journalists also typically cover how Palestinians are portrayed in Western media. Every Palestinian teenager who throws a stone at Israeli soldiers is called a “militant” or worse and Palestinians who take up arms to fight the Israeli occupation of their land, as is their right under international law, are described as “terrorists” when they should be described as resistance fighters.

The heavy pro-Israel bias in Western media reporting is an important reason Israel’s military occupation of Palestine, and the ongoing violence which results from it, has continued for so long.

The answer to all of this is people power — join the weekly global protests in your centre against Israel’s settler colonial project with its apartheid policies against Palestinians.

And give the mainstream media a wide berth on this issue.

John Minto is national chair of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA). This article was first published by The Daily Blog and is republished by Asia Pacific Report with the author’s permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

As Israel presses ahead with strikes in Rafah and seizing the Rafah crossing from Egypt, aid agencies are sounding the alarm of a “catastrophic humanitarian situation”.

Rafah was “significant” because it was the only part in Gaza that had not been terribly damaged by the conflict, United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) senior deputy director Scott Anderson told RNZ Checkpoint.

“Most of the infrastructure is intact,” he said.

“And most importantly, we have 1.4 million of the 2.2 million people in Gaza sheltering here in Rafah. And of that number, more than half are children,” Anderson told Checkpoint.

“It’s the last place of safety within Gaza.”

He said people struggled daily to find food, water, showers and toilets.

Palestinians have now been ordered to evacuate parts of Rafah as Israel prepares for a long-threatened assault on Hamas holdouts in the city.

People displaced five times
Many of the people had already been displaced five or six times, Anderson said.

“And now come the evacuation orders and it makes people very nervous and apprehensive.

“For us it is a concern because Rafah is also where our main supply line for Gaza exists through Kerem Shalom from Israel, or through Rafah Gate from Egypt.”

He said it would affect aid reaching Rafah.

In the north of Gaza, only 30 to 50 trucks could enter a day, whereas Kerem Shalom in the south could accommodate up to 600 trucks.

The Rafah terminal from Egypt was a path for fuel and diesel to come in.

“If we don’t have diesel, we don’t have hospitals running, we don’t have food being delivered, water is not being produced, waste isn’t being picked up, and the sewers aren’t running.

“So those two crossings very much are the lifeline of Gaza, and without those, it could become very much a catastrophic humanitarian situation beyond what already exists.”

Palestinian militant group Hamas has agreed to a Gaza ceasefire proposal from mediators, but Israel said the terms did not meet its demands.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The leader of a New Zealand solidarity group of Palestinian self-determination supporters has accused the country’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters of making a “bluff and bluster” speech at the United Nations that was misleading about inaction at home.

National chair John Minto of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) said in a statement today the Peters speech at the UN General Assembly yesterday was “bluff and bluster . . . [and] a classic case of doing one thing at home and saying another for overseas audiences”.

He said the speech “fooled nobody” in New Zealand.

In his UNGA speech, Peters described Israel’s war on Gaza as an “utter catastrophe” and labelled the besieged enclave a “wasteland”.

He went on to say Israel could “not be under any misconceptions as to its legal obligations”.

Peters also condemned the use of the veto in the UN Security Council five times to block ceasefire resolutions, and Israel’s continued building of illegal settlements on Palestinian land, saying the “misguided notion” and forced displacement of Palestinians “imperil the two-state solution”.

Minto admitted that “these were strong words” but he added that they were “meaningless in the context of what the government has failed to do at home”.

The PSNA chair said Peters had not told his international audience that the New Zealand government had:

• Refused to stop New Zealand military exports which support Israel’s war on Gaza;
• Refused (and still refuses) to condemn Israel for any of its war crimes such as collective punishment, the mass slaughter of over 33,000 Palestinians — mostly women and children — the targeting of aid workers and deliberate starvation of Gaza’s Palestinian population;
• Refused (and still refuses) to call for an immediate permanent ceasefire in Gaza;
• Refused (and still refuses) to reinstate funding for UNRWA (let alone doubling its funding and bringing forward payments which the government has been urged to do);
• Refused (and still refuses) to withdraw from the US war to target Yemen which is acting to oppose Israel’s genocide of Palestinians;
• Refused (and still refuses) to support or join South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice;
• Refused (and still refuses) to shut down the Israeli Embassy; and
• Refused (and still refuses) to grant humanitarian visas for Palestinians with family in New Zealand

“Winston Peters stands with the US/Israel on Gaza in every important respect but has tried to give a different impression to the United Nations,” Minto said.

“There was nothing in his speech which holds Israel to account for its war crimes — not even a single punctuation mark.

“It was a Janus-faced performance at the United Nations.”

UN considers Palestine membership bid
Meanwhile, Palestine’s ambassador at the United Nations, speaking earlier than Peters, was optimistic about the occupied territory’s bid for full membership at the UN. The bid has been referred to a Security Council committee.

“This is a historic moment again,” said Ambassador Riyad Mansour.

The committee is expected to make a decision about Palestine’s status later this month, said Vanessa Frazier, Malta’s UN ambassador.

Al Jazeera’s Gabriel Elizondo is monitoring the latest developments at UN headquarters.

He said the last time Palestine’s bid for full UN membership got this far in 2011, it failed primarily because the US threatened to veto it.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! — The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman.

We turn to Gaza, where aid groups say famine is imminent after five months of US-backed attacks by Israel.

This is in spite of the historic UN Security Council resolution yesterday demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. Fourteen countries voted in favour of the resolution — while the US, Israel’s main ally, abstained.

The head of the UN Palestinian aid agency, UNRWA, says Israel is now denying access to all UNRWA food convoys to northern Gaza, even though the region is on the brink of famine.

UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini wrote on X, quote, “This man-made starvation under our watch is a stain on our collective humanity.”

On Saturday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres travelled to the Rafah border crossing.

SECRETARY-GENERAL ANTÓNIO GUTERRES: A long line of blocked relief trucks on one side of the gates, the long shadow of starvation on the other. That is more than tragic. It is a moral outrage. …

It’s time to truly flood Gaza with lifesaving aid. The choice is clear: either surge or starvation.

Let’s choose the side of help, the side of hope and the right side of history.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re joined by Alex de Waal, the executive director of the World Peace Foundation at Tufts University and author of Mass Starvation: The History and Future of Famine. His new piece for The Guardian, “We are about to witness in Gaza the most intense famine since the Second World War.”

Alex, welcome back to Democracy Now! Describe what’s happening, at a time when Israel is now preventing the largest aid umbrella in Gaza, UNRWA, from delivering aid to northern Gaza, where famine is the most intense.

As Israel blocks more aid, protests mount for a free independent state. Video: Gaza famine

ALEX DE WAAL: Let’s make no mistake: We talk about imminent famine or being at the brink of famine. When a population is in this extreme cataclysmic food emergency, already children are dying in significant numbers of hunger and needless disease, the two interacting in a vicious spiral that is killing them, likely in thousands already. It’s very arbitrary to say we’re at the brink of famine. It is a particular measure of the utter extremity of threat to human survival.

And we have never actually — since the metrics for measuring acute food crisis were developed some 20 years ago, we have never seen a situation either in which an entire population, the entire population of Gaza, is in food crisis, food emergency or famine, or such simple large numbers of people descending into starvation simply hasn’t happened before in our lifetimes.

AMY GOODMAN: How can it be prevented?

ALEX DE WAAL: Well, it’s been very clear. Back in December, the Famine Review Committee of the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) system — and that is the sort of the ultimate arbiter, the high court, if you like, of humanitarian assessments — made it absolutely clear — and I can quote — “The cessation of hostilities in conjunction with the sustained restoration of humanitarian access to the entire Gaza Strip remain the essential prerequisites for preventing famine.”

It said that in December. It reiterated it again last week. There is no way that this disaster can be prevented without a ceasefire and without a full spectrum of humanitarian relief and restoring essential services.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you explain what the IPC is? And also talk about the effects of famine for the rest of the lives of those who survive, of children.

ALEX DE WAAL: So, the IPC, which is short for the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification system, is the system that the international humanitarian agencies adopted some 20 years ago to try and come to a standardised metric. And it uses a five fold classification of food insecurity.

And it comes out in very clearly colour-coded maps, which are very easy to understand. So, green is phase one, which is normal. Yellow is phase two, which is stressed. Orangey brown is phase three, that is crisis.

Red is four, that is emergency.

And in the very first prototype, actually, of the IPC, this was called famine, but they reclassified it as emergency. And dark blood red is catastrophe or famine. And this measures the intensity.

There’s also the question of the magnitude, the sheer numbers involved, which in the case of Gaza means, essentially, the entire population of more than 2 million.

Now, starvation is not just something that is experienced and from which people can recover. We have long-standing evidence — and the best evidence, actually, is from Holland, where the Dutch population suffered what they called the Hunger Winter back in 1944 at the end of the Second World War.

And the Dutch have been able to track the lifelong effects of starvation of young children and children who were not yet born, in utero. And they find that those children, when they grow up, are shorter. They are stunted.

And they have lower cognitive capacities than their elder or younger siblings. And this actually even goes on to the next generation, so that when little girls who are exposed to this grow and become mothers, their own children also suffer those effects, albeit at a lesser scale. So, this will be a calamity that will be felt for generations.

Today I saw long lines of blocked relief trucks waiting to be let into Gaza.

It’s time to truly flood Gaza with life-saving aid.

The choice is clear: surge or starvation.

Let’s choose the side of help, the side of hope & the right side of history.

I will not give up. pic.twitter.com/TTTcnR01bU

— António Guterres (@antonioguterres) March 23, 2024

AMY GOODMAN: What are you calling for, Alex de Waal? I mean, in a moment we’re going to talk about what’s happening in Sudan. It’s horrifying to go from one famine to another. But the idea that we’re talking about a completely man-made situation here.

ALEX DE WAAL: Indeed. It is not only man-made, and therefore, it is men who will stop it. And sadly, of course, even if [with a] ceasefire and humanitarian assistance, it will be too late to save the lives of hundreds, probably thousands, of children who are at the brink now and are living in these terrible, overcrowded situations without basic water, sanitation and services.

A crisis like this cannot be stopped overnight. And it is a crisis that is not just a humanitarian crisis. It is fundamentally a political crisis, a crisis of an abrogation of essentially agreed international humanitarian law, and indeed international criminal law.

There is overwhelming evidence that this is the war crime of starvation being perpetrated at scale.

AMY GOODMAN: Alex de Waal, we’re going to turn now from what’s happening in Gaza. We’ll link to your piece, “We are about to witness in Gaza the most intense famine since the Second World War.”

The original content of this programme is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States Licence.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Thousands marched for Palestine across Australia at the weekend in the wake of Israel’s massacre of more than 100 starving Palestinians who were trying to get flour from an aid truck southwest of Gaza City.

Israel’s siege on Gaza has stopped Palestinians from accessing food, medical supplies and other crucial aid. A United Nations report found that more than 90 percent of the population, more than 2 million people, are facing starvation and malnutrition.

This is made worse by the cutting of funding to the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) by Western governments, the main organisation providing aid to Gaza, after Israel alleged that 12 of its 30,000 staff were involved in the October 7 incursion.

The Labor government has refused to restore funding to UNRWA despite foreign minister Penny Wong conceding she had not seen any evidence to support Israel’s allegations.

“Our government has suspended funding to UNRWA when instead it should be restoring it and increasing it,” Greens senator Larissa Waters told the Meanjin/Brisbane rally on March 3, reported Alex Bainbridge.

Waters said that Foreign Minister Penny Wong was right to condemn Israel’s attack on food vans but that she was “not bowled over by the strength of response because Senator Wong has said she’s going to get her department to have a little word to the Israeli ambassador”.

“That’s all she’s going to do after we saw desperate parents getting slaughtered [while getting] food for their children.”

‘Solidarity with Palestinian women’
The rally had a “Solidarity with Palestinian women” theme in recognition of International Women’s Day on March 8.

Call on global Jewish community to rise up against Israel’s genocide in Gaza.   Video: Green Left

Protesters held a minute’s silence in recognition of United States Air Force serviceperson Aaron Bushnell who self-immolated on February 25 in protest against the US government’s participation in genocide.

Israel has begun its bombardment offensive against Rafah, the small city in southern Gaza where 1.4 million people are sheltering. More than 30,500 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 7.

A YouGov survey found that more than 80 percent of Australians support an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, showing the Palestine solidarity movement has cut through the establishment media pro-Israel messaging.

Edie Shepherd, from the Tzedek Collective, an anti-Zionist Jewish group told thousands at the rally in Gadigal/Sydney on March 3 that the global Jewish community must “rise up against the dominant Zionist frameworks that wield hate, power militarism to carry out atrocities against Palestinians”, reported Peter Boyle.

“The greatest shame is that our survival of genocide has been weaponised to commit genocide against Palestinians now.”

Nasser Mashni, president of the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN), told the March 3 rally in Garramilla/Darwin that “Israelis and Zionists want to kill Palestinians”, reported Stephen W Enciso.

‘They want decolonisation’
“Palestinians do not want to kill Israels. Indigenous folk do not want to kill their colonisers. They just want to be acknowledged. They want [a] treaty. They want their rights. They want restitution. They want racism to stop and decolonisation to start,” he said.

Kulumbirigin Danggalaba Tiwi woman Mililma May drew links between the colonial violence faced by Indigenous people in Australia and Palestine.

She pointed to the coronial inquest into the killing of Kumanjayi Walker by former constable Zachary Rolfe, in which Rolfe gave evidence about widespread racism in the Northern Territory Police Force.

“We are witnessing in plain evidence the racism and the deep horror that exists in the NT police, as across the colony,” May said.

“We live in the same states and under the same violence as Palestine. It just manifests itself in different ways.”

Kites flying for Gaza
A kite-flying for Gaza event was organised by Pilbara for Palestine in Karratha, Western Australia on March 3.

Children made and flew kites decorated with Palestinian flags, watermelons and “Free Palestine” in solidarity with the children on Gaza.

Organiser Chris Jenkins told Green Left that the action “demonstrated once again that support for Palestine exists from the CBD to the bush”.

The community also raised money for UNRWA.

In Muloobinba/Newcastle a “Hands off Rafah” rally and kite-flying event was held on March 2 at Nobby’s Beach, reported Khaled Ghannam.

Former Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon, who visited Palestine in June last year, said the Israeli occupation impacts on everything Palestinians do.

“One of the common things that people we interviewed said was, ‘please take our voice to the world’,” she said.

“We are part of a massive global movement, millions of people are on the move around the world in so many countries, with a similar message to us:

• Ceasefire now,
• Restore UNRWA funding, and
• End the occupation.”

She said the UN had called on Australia and other countries to stop arming Israel.

Republished with permission from Green Left.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Senator and deputy leader of the Australian Greens party Mehreen Faruqi says the survival of millions of people in Gaza depends on the “live-saving” humanitarian aid provided by UNRWA, and it is “totally irresponsible” to cut funds to the UN agency.

“Western countries, like Australia, who have suspended this aid [to UNRWA] have made a pretty disgraceful and morally indefensible decision,” she said.|

“We know that people are being starved in Gaza at the moment. We know that there is a humanitarian crisis.

“We know that there is a mission of genocide that Israel is committing, and at this time to suspend aid is disgraceful,” Faruqi told Al Jazeera.

Australia joined some 15 US-led countries to cut UNRWA funding by US$667 million — more than half of its total pledges.

The people of Australia had taken to the streets to protest over “weeks and weeks” in support of Gaza. But the government was refusing to listen to their demands, Faruqi said.

“By refusing to listen to the people of Australia, the Australian government is making decisions that are completely opposed to the sentiments, feelings and demands of the Australian people,” she said.

‘People can see . . . 26,000 have been massacred’
“People in Australia can actually see what is going on in Gaza. They can see more than 26,000 people have been massacred.

“They can see that more than 12,000 of those are children. This is completely unacceptable. This [Israeli] mission of genocide.

“And especially the cheerleading by Australia, by the UK, by the US of this invasion of Gaza is reprehensible.”

UNRWA’s funds should be restored immediately and increased, Faruqi added.

Countries such as Ireland, Norway and Spain have continued to fund UNRWA – in some cases increasing their aid — and have condemned the funding cuts as an “attack on humanity”.

New Zealand is currently still funding UNRWA and will review the situation before its next instalment is due mid-year.

‘Happy to keep war going’

Also interviewed by Al Jazeera, independent journalist Antony Loewenstein, author of The Palestine Laboratory exposing the Israeli military profit machine, talked about the views of the Israeli population and the Jewish diaspora.

Answering a question about Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s declared goal of “total victory” as the war drags on, Loewenstein acknowledged how global diasporas were split in their opinions with younger Jewish groups in the US increasingly seeking a ceasefire, but his view of Israel was grim.

“One of the things that is really clear. . . is that most Israelis want their hostages back, which makes sense. But at the same time they are also very happy to keep the war going.

“In fact, most polls do not suggest that the majority of Israeli Jews want the war to end.,” he said.

“They do want Hamas to be removed in some way. What that looks like, of course is up to debate.”

Author Antony Loewenstein discusses Jewish diaspora splits over the Gaza war. Video: Al Jazeera

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark, who led the UN Development Programme which oversees UNRWA, told RNZ Morning Report today it was the biggest platform for getting humanitarian aid into Gaza for a populations that is 85 percent displaced.

People are on the verge on starvation and going without medical supplies, she said.

“If you’re going to defund and destroy this platform, then the misery and suffering of the people under bombardment can only increase and you can only have more deaths.”

Clark said it was “most regrettable that countries have acted in this precipitous way to defund the organisation on the basis of allegations”.

Al Jazeera reports that top Palestinian officials and Hamas have criticised the decision by nearly a dozen Western countries led by the US to suspend funding UNRWA — the UN relief agency for Palestinians — and called for an immediate reversal of the move, which entails “great” risk.

Ireland and Norway have confirmed continued support for UNRWA, saying the agency does crucial work to help Palestinians displaced and in desperate need of assistance in Gaza.

The Norwegian aid agency said the people of Gaza would “starve in the streets” without UNRWA humanitarian assistance.

Hamas’ media office said in a post on Telegram: “We ask the UN and the international organisations to not cave into the threats and blackmail” from Israel.

Defunding ‘not right decision’
Former PM Clark did not deny the allegations made were serious, but said defunding the agency without knowing the outcome of the investigation was not the right decision, RNZ reports.

“I led an organisation that had tens of thousands of people on contracts at any one time. Could I say, hand on heart, people never did anything wrong? No I couldn’t. But what I could say was that any allegations would be fully investigated and results made publicly known,” she said.

UNRWA funding cuts — why Israel is trying to destroy the UN Palestinian aid agency.  Video: Al Jazeera

“That’s exactly what the head of UNRWA has said, it’s what the Secretary-General’s saying, that process is underway, but this is not a time to be just cutting off the funding because a small minority of UNRWA staff face allegations.”

Luxon suggested Clark’s plea would not affect New Zealand’s response.

“I appreciate that, but we’re the government, and they’re serious allegations, they need to be understood and investigated and when the foreign minister [Winston Peters] says that he’s done that and he’s happy for us to contribute and continue to contribute, we’ll do that.”

Clark said people could starve to death or die because they did not receive the medication they needed in the meantime.

Halting aid to Gaza via UNRWA is “deeply twisted and harmful”.
…And Australia has joined in the halt. https://t.co/17gV0AyPaj pic.twitter.com/5b7DU6dOaB

— Peter Cronau (@PeterCronau) January 30, 2024

If major donor countries like the United States and Germany continued to withhold funding, UNRWA would go down and there was no alternative, she said.

Clark did not believe there was any coincidence in the allegations being made known at the same time as the International Court of Justice’s ruling on the situation in Gaza.

According to the BBC, the court ordered Israel to do everything in its power to refrain from killing and injuring Palestinians and do more to “prevent and punish” public incitement to genocide. Tel Aviv must report back to the court on its actions within a month.

Clark said the timing of the UNRWA allegations was an attempt to deflect the significant rulings made of the court and dismiss them.

“I think it’s fairly obvious what was happening.”

States must reverse cruel decision to withdraw UNRWA funding ⬇️
https://t.co/JRMfHH9P04

— Amnesty International (@amnesty) January 29, 2024

Israel had provided the agency with information alleging a dozen staff were involved in the October 7 attack by Hamas fighters in southern Israel, which left about 1300 dead and about 250 taken as hostages.

More than 26,000 people — mostly women and children — have been killed in Gaza since Israel launched a major military operation in response, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A New Zealander working for the UN refugee agency for Palestinians says having countries pull funding is devastating.

Speaking from Geneva, Hector Sharp told RNZ Midday Report UNRWA was the only organisation with the ability to deliver the kind of aid needed in Gaza.

“We’ve been doing this for 75 years, so we’re quite good at it,” he said.

“In Gaza, we have nearly two million people of the 2.3 million residents completely dependent on UNRWA for their daily shelter, food, and survival.”

Sharp said what was happening now in Gaza was a man-made famine.

“This loss of funding comes at a time where UNRWA is a lifeline for millions of people,” he said.

Sharp said they were urging the countries that had cut funding to reverse those decisions.

He said the allegations of staff from UNRWA being involved in the October 7 attacks came as a shock.

“United Nations employees must remain neutral, independent, and impartial,” he said.

UNRWA is ‘humanitarian’
“UNRWA is a humanitarian agency — we don’t have a police force, we don’t have an intelligence service or a criminal justice capacity, so we have no authority to monitor what our staff do outside their work.

“But, we also don’t work in a vacuum, our staff are drawn from a population which is under ongoing occupation and we are aware of the neutrality risks that this poses,” Sharp said.

New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said it would review its contribution for the UNRWA, which is under fire after 12 of its staff allegedly took part in the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7.

The ministry said in a statement that this country had been providing UNRWA with $1 million a year in funding.

“As we always do prior to releasing funds, we will assess the situation again prior to that payment being made,” the statement said.

At least nine countries, including top donors the US and Germany, had paused funding after allegations by Israel about 12 staff who had since been dismissed.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Agnes Callamard, the secretary general of Amnesty International, has called the funding cuts to the UN’s Palestinian humanitarian relief agency a “heartless decision” by some of the world’s richest countries “to punish the most vulnerable population on earth because of the alleged crimes of 12 people”.

In a post on X, formerly Twitter, she added: “Right after the ICJ [International Court of Justice] ruling finding risk of genocide. Sickening.”

While nine Western nations, including the US, rushed to suspend UNRWA’s funding after allegations that members from the agency participated in the October 7 attack, the same countries have failed to formally revise their ties to Israel despite mounting reports of genocidal abuse by Israeli forces.

Sickening heartless decision of the richest countries in the world to punish the most vulnerable population on earth because of the alleged crimes of 12 people. Right after the ICJ ruling finding risk of genocide. Sickening. https://t.co/ARrPqUdyHA

— Agnes Callamard (@AgnesCallamard) January 28, 2024

The Director-General of the World Health Organisation, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said that “cutting off funding” to UNRWA at what he called a “critical moment” would only “hurt the people of Gaza who desperately need support”.

The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs highlighted the plight of some 1.9 million displaced Palestinians in Gaza with the main UN agency delivering humanitarian aid losing its major financial backing.

“Scenes of forcibly displaced people are a disgrace to humanity,” it said in a statement.

“Over half a million Palestinians in Khan Younis were instructed by the occupying forces to evacuate their homes, including hospitals and health centres, in a cruel expansion and deepening of forced displacement from southern regions.”

UNRWA employs about 30,000 people and provides humanitarian aid, education, health and social services to 5.9 eligible Palestinian refugees living in Gaza, the occupied West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.

The UN agency received almost US$1.2 billion in pledged in 2020, with the US being the biggest donor providing $343.9 million. The fifth-largest donor, Norway, provided $34.2 million and is continuing is funding in spite of the action by the US and its allies.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz