Experts tasked with investigating the neutrality of the UN agency refugees (UNRWA), in light of Israel's claims that its officials participated in the attacks against the Jewish state on October 7, recommended tightening security measures in eight critical areas, DPA reported, quoted by BTA.
At the same time, the experts' report presented yesterday in New York says that Israel has not yet provided evidence that some of the agency's employees were members of terrorist organizations.
The independent group of experts, headed by former French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonnade, was established at the beginning of February, according to DPA.
UNRWA, which is the main provider of humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip, has faced a major crisis after Israel accused a dozen of its staff of taking part in the October 7 attacks that killed around 1,200 people.
Several employees were fired as a result of the allegations. In the following days and weeks, 16 donor countries, including the two largest donors, the United States and Germany, suspended or temporarily suspended funding, resulting in a funding shortfall of approximately $450 million.
After the allegations came to light, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres promised a full investigation.
Despite rules introduced in recent years, "problems related to neutrality persist," the expert report says.
It listed "eight critical areas where immediate improvement is needed" to preserve the UN agency's neutrality. These include donor engagement, neutrality of staff and conduct, neutrality of education and governance.
Israel sharply criticized the document. The report "ignores the seriousness of the problem," Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Oren Marmorstein wrote on the X social network.
"The UNRWA problem in Gaza is not about a few bad apples; it is a rotten and poisonous tree whose roots are in "Hamas", he wrote.
"Hamas" has penetrated UNRWA so deeply that it is no longer possible to determine where UNRWA ends and "Hamas" begins, writes Marmorstein.
"This is not what a real and thorough report looks like. This is how the efforts to avoid the problem, and not to solve it directly, look like", the spokesperson points out. "UNRWA is part of the problem, not part of the solution," he adds.
"There are other solutions. UNRWA cannot be part of the solution in Gaza now or in the future," Marmorstein wrote.