Funding failed paradigms for Palestinians in Gaza

Humanitarian aid is a failed paradigm, be it the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees or the Board of Peace’s scheming. UNRWA has always faced funding problems and it was never structured to deal with ongoing colonial expansion. The Board of Peace, on the other hand, has failed to generate funds for its alleged humanitarian concerns in Gaza and the reason is because it was never designed to truly meet humanitarian needs.

The Board of Peace exists to facilitate Israel’s expulsion of the Palestinians from Gaza, so why should countries fund its humanitarian paradigm?

US Ambassador to the UN Jeff Bartos begs to differ, it seems. Speaking at the UNRWA annual pledging conference, Bartos’s appeal to UNRWA’s donors was to fund the Board of Peace instead. Mocking the repetitive rhetoric, which is a staple of any international institution not just UNRWA, Bartos told UN member states, “This year you have the opportunity to give the Palestinians in Gaza the opportunity to find durable solutions and prosper instead of subjecting them to endless cycles of dependency and forever refugeehood.”

This time, Bartos said, things are different, as the UN Security Council “strongly endorsed” US President Donald Trump’s 20-point plan and the creation of the Board of Peace. 

Things are different up to a certain point. The UN was never created to support self-determination, liberation and anti-colonial resistance. It was created to support former colonial powers to retain their dominance.

Therefore, what happened at the UN Security Council was a bigger manifestation of decades of subjugating Palestinians to Israeli colonialism. 

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UNRWA is barely able to provide lasting alleviation anymore, let alone provide opportunities for Palestinians to reclaim their own personal independence that can later translate into social cohesion and political trajectories away from the current factions, if Palestinians choose to. Humanitarian aid is political, as we have seen most strongly since the genocide in Gaza. It was politicians that decided on humanitarian pauses, and politicians decided when it was time to speak up against starvation, even though Israel’s politics had made it clear that starvation was being used as a weapon aiding genocide in Gaza.

Funding the Board of Peace will not, as Bartos claims, enable Palestinians in Gaza to reclaim any form of independence or magically no longer remain refugees. Colonialism does not work that way. Neither does the Board of Peace. Several statements by the Board of Peace’s High Representative for Gaza Nickolay Mladenov attest to complicity with Israel’s plan to completely occupy Gaza militarily. This means that the Board of Peace is in line with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Nentanyahu’s aim to completely expel Palestinians from Gaza. Palestinians in Gaza have been forcibly displaced multiple times and now forced to live on the remaining 30 percent of land that remains out of Israel control for now. 

The international community does have a choice, but the choice is not between UNRWA and the Board of Peace.

The choice has always been decolonisation, but neither the UN nor the Board of Peace are willing to step away from profitable monstrosities. 

BLOG: Like Israel’s colonial expansion, the UN’s narratives also place Palestinians at risk

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.