The inspector general of the US Agency for International Development found that 101 UNRWA teachers, school principals and other staff members were Hamas terrorists who took part in the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks. The US may soon designate UNRWA a foreign terrorist organization.
The main oversight body responsible for monitoring US foreign aid uncovered evidence that 101 additional staff members at UNRWA took part in the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks and are affiliated with Hamas' military wing, according to an investigative report sent to the State Department, as reported by the Washington Free Beacon.
The Office of Inspector General of the US Agency for International Development, a law enforcement entity separate from USAID itself, which is now largely inactive, determined last Friday that a long list of "school principals, teachers, security personnel, orderlies, psychosocial counselors and medical staff at UNRWA" were also members of Hamas' Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades or other terrorist factions. The inspector general determined that all 101 current or former UNRWA employees should be added to a comprehensive government blacklist, which would prevent them from participating in any US foreign aid project for a period of 10 years.
Among the UNRWA personnel exposed as terrorists were a deputy school principal who served as a deputy company commander in Hamas, as well as a deputy school principal who served as a squad commander in the Khan Younis Brigade. Another teacher served, according to the evidence uncovered, as a platoon commander in the Central Brigade, while a mathematics and computer science teacher was found to have "ties to an al-Qassam intelligence cell." A third UNRWA instructor had "expertise as a sniper for Hamas," and a fourth served as a "Hamas soldier with orders to bring two anti-tank missiles to a pre-arranged location during the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks." Another UNRWA deputy school principal served as a platoon commander in a Hamas battalion, with responsibility for communications and communication tools on Oct. 7.
So far, the inspector general's investigation has led to the blacklisting of 108 people over their participation in Oct. 7 and/or because of their ties to Hamas.
"The agency is crawling with Hamas operatives"
A recently published study revealed that hundreds of UNRWA employees maintained ties with Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, according to research by UN Watch. The data was collected over a decade and shows how deeply rooted and extensive the relationship is between the "Palestinian refugee relief agency" and terrorist organizations in Gaza and abroad.
"This tool exposes what UNRWA and its supporters have tried to hide for years," UN Watch Executive Director Hillel Neuer said. "UNRWA claims to be a humanitarian agency, but the evidence proves that this agency is crawling with Hamas operatives. Many of its employees are not impartial civil servants, but terrorists in UN uniforms. The problem is not 'a few rotten apples in the barrel,' as the International Court of Justice ruled last week. The problem is structural, widespread and deliberately created. Continuing to fund UNRWA is not support for humanitarian work, it is tacit consent to terrorism."
