The UN’s Palestinian Aid Controversy: What’s at Stake

Is UNRWA still functioning in Gaza? 

The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) continues to operate in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, providing critical services to Palestinians in need. As of January 2025, UNRWA has 33,000 employees who deliver services to Palestinian refugees in all areas that the agency operates in. In East Jerusalem, however, UNRWA international staff were forced to leave in late January after Israeli authorities refused to renew their work visas. 

In addition to providing food assistance to nearly two million people in Gaza, the agency also remains the territory’s largest operating health-care provider. Since October 7, 2023, UNRWA has performed more than 7.6 million medical consultations; additional support from other UN agencies such as the UN Children’s Fund and World Health Organization has also allowed UNRWA to vaccinate children against polio.

How is UNRWA funded?   

Historically, UNRWA has received voluntary support from UN member states and regional blocs such as the European Union, totaling roughly 89 percent of all financial contributions made to the agency. In 2024, UNRWA’s operating budget was more than $880 million, approximately 95 percent of which came from voluntary contributions from states, while the remaining 5 percent was from the United Nations’ regular budget. That same year, the United States—the agency’s largest donor—contributed nearly $122 million to UNRWA [PDF], far below the $371 million it contributed the previous year. 

Other countries have also reduced or halted their funding to UNRWA, largely due to the increasing difficulty of delivering aid to Palestinians. Some countries, such as Sweden, have instead decided to increase their overall humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip via other avenues, including the UN World Food Program and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Considered a temporary institution upon its establishment, UNRWA now serves as the primary provider of shelter, food, water, and employment for many Palestinians. In addition to preventing the risk of famine through its delivery of essential aid, UNRWA provides mattresses, hygiene kits, blankets, and vaccines for children against childhood diseases such as measles and mumps.  

Why is UNRWA engulfed in controversy? 

In January 2024, Israel provided the U.S. government with a dossier of twelve UNRWA employees who were allegedly involved in Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attacks on southern Israel. The agency immediately fired ten of the employees while the other two were confirmed dead. By the end of January, around a dozen countries had suspended their aid to UNRWA, including the agency’s two largest donors, the United States and Germany. (Shortly after taking office in January 2025, U.S. President Donald Trump announced that the United States would not resume funding for UNRWA.)

UNRWA reported in March 2024 that Israeli authorities had coerced several of its employees into falsely stating the agency’s link to Hamas. UNRWA later released a report detailing the ill treatment of several employees detained by the Israeli army. When asked about the accusations of coercion, an Israeli military spokesperson said that it “acts in accordance with Israeli and international law to protect the rights of the detainees.”

“UNRWA is the backbone of all humanitarian response in Gaza,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said following countries’ aid suspensions in early 2024. Guterres also emphasized the outsized risk UNRWA workers in Gaza face to provide relief—as of February 21, 2025, 274 UNRWA staff members have been killed since the start of the war. 

Why is Gaza dependent on UNRWA?

UNRWA is the only UN agency that provides direct services to Palestinian refugees. On December 8, 1949, UN Resolution 302 (IV) established UNRWA to carry out relief for Palestinian refugees displaced by what the Palestinians call the Nakba (Arabic for catastrophe) or what Israelis refer to as the War of Independence. Nearly 700,000 Palestinians were displaced and fled to neighboring Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria, or were internally displaced in Gaza and the West Bank. 

UNRWA served hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees when it began operating in 1950 and it has since provided assistance to four generations of refugees and descendants of male Palestinian refugees [PDF]. The agency continues to operate because the “Palestine refugee problem” has yet to be resolved. The guidelines for who can claim assistance from UNRWA are strict and clearly lay out qualifications and disqualifications.

Considered a temporary institution upon its establishment, UNRWA now serves as the primary provider of shelter, food, water, and employment for many Palestinians. In addition to preventing the risk of famine through its delivery of essential aid, UNRWA provides mattresses, hygiene kits, blankets, and vaccines for children against childhood diseases such as measles and mumps.  

Where else does UNRWA operate?

UNRWA has historically operated in countries and territories in the region that have housed Palestinian refugees since 1948—Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip. The agency maintains two headquarters: one in Jordan’s capital, Amman, and another in the Gaza Strip. Recently, however, the Israeli Knesset—following the adoption of two bills in October 2024—prohibited UNRWA’s activities in Israel and the Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip, and the West Bank. 

The legislation received criticism from the UN General Assembly, which supported UNRWA in a resolution in December 2024 demanding an immediate and permanent cease-fire in Gaza and that Israel allow UNRWA to proceed with aid operations without restriction. The United States, Israel, and seven other countries voted no on the resolution, while eleven countries abstained.

The Palestinian refugee crisis has existed for nearly eight decades, and UNRWA’s operations are vital to providing displaced Palestinians—many of whom still live in camps established in 1948—with necessary services that host countries cannot or will not offer them. In Lebanon, the government is already struggling with overcrowded classrooms, a financial crisis, and political malaise, and in Syria, UNRWA continues to serve the remaining Palestinian refugees there who experience food insecurity because of the country’s civil war.

Michael Bricknell and Will Merrow created the graphics for this In Brief.