‘Shocking’: UNRWA chief denounces Israel’s destruction of agency headquarters

The head of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees said Monday he was horrified by the destruction by Israeli forces of the headquarters of the key humanitarian organization in Gaza City, which the Israeli military recently attacked and left in ruins.

“Shocking,” wrote Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), in a social media post that included photos of the bombed headquarters complex.

“UNRWA headquarters in Gaza has become a battlefield and has been razed to the ground,” Lazzarini continued. “This is another episode of blatant disregard for international humanitarian law. United Nations facilities must be protected at all times. They must never be used for military or combat purposes. Every war has its rules. Gaza is no exception.”

Photos of the destroyed UNRWA headquarters have emerged after a deadly weekend of Israeli bombings in the Gaza Strip, overshadowed in the media by the attempted assassination of former US President Donald Trump on Saturday.

More than 140 people were killed and hundreds more wounded on Saturday and Sunday, including in Israeli airstrikes on a so-called “safe zone” in southern Gaza.

Tamara Alrifai, UNRWA’s external relations officer, said: Al Jazeera Monday, “last week was one of the deadliest in Gaza since the war began.”

“The images coming to us from UNRWA headquarters are truly shocking,” Alrifai said. “What I saw today in the images is unrecognizable.”

UNRWA and its infrastructure in Gaza, including schools, have become major targets of the far-right Israeli government since its latest offensive against the Palestinian enclave began in October, following a deadly attack by Hamas. Israeli officials have repeatedly claimed, without providing evidence, that a significant number of UNRWA employees are members of terrorist organizations.

Nearly 200 UNRWA facilities in Gaza, most of which serve as shelters for displaced people, have been damaged during Israel’s war on the besieged territory, Alrifai said Monday. About 500 people have been killed in Israeli attacks on UNRWA facilities, Alrifai said.

“This speaks volumes about the blatant disregard for international humanitarian law,” she said.

Israeli air and ground attacks on Gaza continued Monday, as much of the territory’s population faces catastrophic levels of hunger. Since the onslaught began, Israel has severely restricted the flow of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, depriving Palestinians of food, medicine, clean water and other basic necessities.

ReutersIsrael “struck the south and centre of the Gaza Strip” on Monday and “blew up several houses”.

“Medical officials said they found 10 bodies of Palestinians killed by Israeli fire in eastern areas of the city, some of whom had already begun to decompose,” the news agency added. “The army also stepped up its aerial and armored bombardment in central Gaza, in the historic al-Bureij and al-Maghazi refugee camps. Health officials said five Palestinians were killed in an Israeli airstrike on a house in the Maghazi camp.”