Canadian foreign minister Anita Anand announced the country would provide an additional $100 million in funding to support the UN, the Red Cross, the Red Crescent, and other NGOs last week, within days of UNRWA confirming it had terminated the contracts of 70 staff members in Gaza for ties with UNRWA, according to a statement by the foreign ministry.
The funding assistance brings Canada’s total contribution to $500 million for the Palestinian territories. The financial assistance will reportedly help provide emergency medical assistance, food and nutrition, water, sanitation, shelter, protection services, and stabilization initiatives.
“Today, Canada announced $100 million in funding to deliver urgent humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza and the West Bank. The funding will be delivered through the UN, Red Cross, and NGO partners, bringing our overall humanitarian assistance to over half a billion dollars,” Anand announced.
“In addition, we also launched the International Peace Fund for Israel and Palestine with the UK and Australia to support civil society organizations in their grassroots work to build peace between Israelis and Palestinians. To this end, we put forward a $1.8 million commitment. We will keep working with both Israelis and Palestinians and thank all civil society organizations present in Paris today for their contributions.”
UNRWA's official announcement statement on the terminations claimed that the action was taken "to mitigate safety and security risks for the refugees the Agency serves," and it emphasized that Israel had not provided any evidence to back up its accusations, and that the employees' firing was not intended to be a validation of those claims.
UNRWA terminates 70 staff members for links to terror group Hamas
The UNRWA staff union complained that "making such a decision without a fair and transparent investigation constitutes a clear violation of the principles of justice."
The terminations followed the referral of 101 current or former UNRWA staff members to the US State Department for suspension or disbarment over their role in the October 7 massacre and/or affiliation with Hamas by USAID’s Office of Inspector-General.
Following the referrals, a representative from UNRWA told The Jerusalem Post, “We take these allegations very, very seriously, and any allegation of neutrality breach made against staff will be taken very seriously, and that includes alleged membership in sanctioned Palestinian groups.”
“We have a zero-tolerance policy for neutrality breaches, and that means there is no place in UNRWA for terrorists, or criminals, or those who don’t share the values of the United Nations,” he continued.
