Jordan slams Israel’s ‘defiance of international law’ 

Jordan yesterday strongly condemned a protest held by right-wing Israelis outside the headquarters of the UN agency for Palestine refugees (UNRWA) in East Jerusalem as “blatant defiance of international law”, Anadolu reported.

Right-wing groups staged protests outside the UNRWA office in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood on Tuesday evening to call for its closure.

UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini denounced the protest, during which demonstrators tried to storm the site, as “intimidation” and “vandalism.”

The protest “is a blatant defiance of international law that stipulates the need to protect United Nations facilities,” the Jordanian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

It held Israel “responsible for protecting the headquarters and staff of international organisations providing humanitarian aid to civilians in the occupied Palestinian territories, including Gaza.”

READ: Jordan says Israel settlers attacked Jordanian aid convoys on way to Gaza

UNRWA was created by the UN General Assembly more than 70 years ago to assist Palestinians who were forcibly displaced from their land to make way for the creation of the state of Israel.

The agency provides crucial support to millions of Palestinian refugees in the Gaza Strip, West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.

Israel has lobbied hard to have UNRWA closed as it is the only UN agency to have a specific mandate to look after the basic needs of Palestinian refugees. If the agency no longer exists, argues Israel, then the refugee issue must no longer exist, and the legitimate right for Palestinian refugees to return to their land will be unnecessary. Israel has denied that right of return since the late 1940s, even though its own membership of the UN was made conditional upon Palestinian refugees being allowed to return to their homes and land.