UNRWA receives coveted award from Basque Gov’t

The Basque Government has awarded UNRWA the 2024 Ignacio Ellacuria Prize for Cooperation and Solidarity as a result of its “dedication to the Palestinian people over 75 years in a context of continuous conflict”.

The jury highlighted “the more human side of the direct work that it carries out in favour of justice and human rights with the Palestinian population” and concluded that it deserves this award “because of the real risk of disappearing,” since “it would imply taking away the Palestinian population’s right to refuge and the right of return to their lands and homes.”

UNRWA works in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria and supports around 5.9 million Palestinians, providing them with education, medical care, camp infrastructure, microfinancing and other essentials.

Over the past few years, however, funding for the agency has been cut by donor states, while Israel has worked to defame and defund it.

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.

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