The Euro-Mediterranean Observatory for Human Rights (EOHR) has underlined that the reduction of the UNRWA budget would lead to depriving more than 5.8 million Palestinian refugees of basic services, such as education and healthcare, as well as the closure of 702 UNRWA schools, thus depriving more than half a million students of education, in addition to the termination of the services of some 30,000 staff members who work for the Agency.

These facts foreshadow a human and social catastrophe whose consequences cannot be predicted. The observatory’s report issued last Sunday included a series of recent UNRWA measures to reduce its relief services and minimize the number of employees in its five areas of operation and the potential catastrophic impact of such reduction.

Moreover, EOHR pointed out that despite UNRWA’s pledge, through its Commissioner-General Pierre Krähenbühl, to continue providing services to Palestinian refugees, the financial crisis that UNRWA has been experiencing since the US announced its assistance cuts and the international community’s failure to take serious steps to support the agency, has begun to have a practical impact.

It is noteworthy that the Euro-Mediterranean team has recorded actual steps of reducing the services provided to refugees and minimizing the number of staff working in the Agency, which threatens to be the first of other steps that may lead to the termination of the Agency’s work, especially with the repeated “Israeli” calls in this regard.