The image from Gaza that still haunts me: Palestine relief agency chief

This article is published in association with United Nations.

Asking the softly spoken, veteran humanitarian worker Philippe Lazzarini how he feels as he comes to the end of his second term as the head of the UN agency for Palestinians, UNRWA, is perhaps an unfair question. 

“No doubt that I have mixed feelings today,” he says. “Bitterness, because I have been at the forefront over the last two years of extraordinary breaches of international law, witnessing atrocities, attacks against the United Nations; sadness, because many of our colleagues have been killed – nearly 400 in two years – that’s never been seen in the entire United Nations history.

“But, also some pride, because over the last two years, I have seen how our staff…have been extraordinarily committed to try to alleviate the suffering of a number of their own communities”.

© WHO/Ahmed Zakot

Air strikes on Gaza continue. (file)

Aftermath of 7 October

In addition to being the face of an organization constantly berated and accused online of collaborating with Hamas fighters in Gaza, the 62-year-old Swiss national has watched the disastrous impact of the Israeli war on the enclave’s people and his agency, sparked by Hamas-led terror attacks in Israel, in October 2023.

A high-level UN investigation into the accusations against UNRWA found that of 19 staff members accused of involvement in the terror attacks, one case was found to lack any supporting evidence and nine others lacked sufficient evidence to indicate involvement.

In the remaining nine cases, evidence indicated that the UNRWA staff may have been involved in the 7 October attacks, at which point the agency announced they would be sacked.

Today, the misery and death across the Gaza Strip continues, with one Gazan encounter from early in the conflict particularly hard to forget, despite Mr. Lazzarini’s many years working in conflict settings around the world, from Angola to Iraq and Somalia to South Sudan.

Haunted by hunger with human eyes

“It was a young girl I met in Rafah four weeks into the war and already I saw her with empty eyes begging in fact for a sip of water, a loaf of bread, in the school where she used to be a student. So, the school [that] should be a place of joy and education became a place of misery and shelter for these young girls. And I have to say, I have been haunted by this.”

And although there is a ceasefire in Gaza between Hamas fighters and Israel today, it is “in name only”, he insists, with people still being killed because they do not know where the shifting border is between them and the Israeli military.

“It’s nothing else than just misery,” he continues. “We might have reversed the tide of deepening hunger in Gaza but nothing else. People are still living in the rubble, are still waiting for hours to get some clean water. They are fighting and struggling against disease.”

© WFP/Maxime Le Lijour

Children wait to be served a hot meal at a communal kitchen in Gaza.

No real alternative

Amid such suffering, Mr. Lazzarini dismisses suggestions that another body could take UNRWA’s place. “You do not have an existing alternative in Gaza,” he insists. “UNRWA is the only organization which has the manpower, the expertise, the community trust when it comes to public health, education services. There are no other NGOs or UN organizations. But we also know that the Palestinian Authority is not ready to take over these services.”

Beyond the attacks on UNRWA staff and on hundreds of the agency’s buildings in Gaza, its ability to provide key services in Gaza and beyond has been severely limited by a lack of financial support from the international community to match the three-year extension of its mandate passed by the UN General Assembly last December.

Running on empty

Despite austerity measures – including reduced services and a 20 per cent salary cut for most local staff – Mr. Lazzarini’s warning to the General Assembly President that UNRWA “may soon no longer be viable” without hard cash still stands. But political support is invaluable, too, and not just for his agency’s survival, he explains.

“The attacks on UNRWA are not an exception, cannot be dealt (with) in isolation. If we tolerate it for an agency like ours, others will follow. And that’s exactly what happened in Gaza: the UN agencies have been finger-pointed at being infiltrated by Hamas to justify action against them…And now we hear exactly the same narrative, we see the same pattern being implemented in Lebanon.”

© UNRWA

UNRWA teams in Gaza City continue to provide medical services.

Israel’s ‘silent war’ on the West Bank

Away from Gaza, the dire situation for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank facing increasing attacks by Israeli settlers has also highlighted the “silent war” taking place there “in total impunity”, Mr. Lazzarini continues.

In January, Israeli bulldozers moved into UNRWA headquarters in East Jerusalem and proceeded to demolish buildings there, as an Israeli flag was hoisted atop the UN complex – a move strongly condemned as a violation of international law by the global organization.

“When we talk about, you know, the respect of international law, we have seen that this blatant disdain and disregard – the fact that everything has been conducted without any respect of the rule of war – has also allowed now the spread of a conflict into Iran with no justification to initiate such a large-scale war impacting the entire region,” the UNRWA chief maintains.

© UNICEF/Alaa Badarneh

Families flee their homes in the West Bank, due to the ongoing escalation of violence. (file)

‘Extreme pressure’

Despite the global turmoil raging around the world, back in Geneva, Mr. Lazzarini appears relaxed. He could easily be mistaken for a visitor in his wax coat, suede shoes, jacket and tie, but clothes are perhaps the last thing on his mind.

Readily conceding that he has faced “extreme pressure” from attacks against himself and UNRWA in the past two years, the top UN diplomat cites his family’s support as one of the principal reasons why he has been able to continue working.

“I haven’t been present over the last two years,” he says, adding determinedly that once he leaves UNRWA, his plans include playing catch-up “to retrieve” his wife and children, as well as writing about his experiences at the helm of a UN agency whose future remains at the mercy of geopolitics.

© UNRWA

UNRWA Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini visits colleagues in Gaza. (file)