Unrwa expects countries to review funding suspension following probe

Unrwa, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, has said that it expects donors to review suspensions of funding following the publication of an upcoming preliminary report adressing Israeli allegations about its employees. 

Last month, Israel alleged that 12 of Unrwa's 30,000 employees took part in attacks on southern Israeli communities on 7 October.

The preliminary report will be available "in several weeks," according to Unrwa's Lebanon representative Dorothee Klaus. 

"We assume donors would look into their decisions of having suspended funding to Unrwa," Klaus said. 

The US, UK, Germany and Canada were among sixteen countries which paused financing the agency following Israel's allegations. 

Unrwa was established in 1949 - a year after the Nakba (or catastrophe) in which 750,000 Palestinians were forced from their homes during the creation of Israel - to provide healthcare, education and humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, the occupied West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. 

In Gaza, it runs 183 schools, 22 health facilities and seven women's centres, among several other facilities. Over 150 of Unrwa's staff have been killed by Israeli attacks since war broke out.