Qatar and UNRWA head discuss obstacles to aid entering Gaza

Qatar and the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) have discussed obstacles to humanitarian aid entering the Gaza Strip. Minister of State for International Cooperation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Lolwah Al-Khater, led the telephone discussion on developments in Gaza and the occupied Palestinian territories with UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini.

The two officials touched on cooperation between Qatar and the agency, ways to remove obstacles preventing the entry of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, and a number of topics of common interest. The Qatari minister stressed that Doha would continue to support the UN agency, whose responsibilities have doubled in light of the current catastrophic humanitarian situation facing Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

“It is important to reach an immediate ceasefire and allow more humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip,” stressed the minister.

In early June, the Qatari Foreign Ministry condemned Israel’s attempts to designate UNRWA as a “terrorist organisation,” calling for plans to liquidate the agency to be challenged. Israel’s targeting of UNRWA, it said, came amid the increasing need for the agency’s humanitarian services due to the catastrophic repercussions of the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip.

Qatar also called on the international community to stand firmly against Israel’s plans to have UNRWA closed and deprive millions of Palestinian refugees in the Gaza Strip, the occupied West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon of its vital services.

The Israeli Knesset approved on 22 July three draft laws to classify UNRWA as a terrorist organisation, banning the agency’s work in the country and lifting the immunity granted to its employees.

OPINION: What’s behind Israel’s war against UNRWA?