Following confirmation of the complicity of the United Nations’ Relief and Works Agency, or Unrwa, in the murders and other heinous crimes Hamas committed in southern Israel on October 7, the bloated NGO has come under much overdue scrutiny. Hundreds of Unrwa staffers have been active in the military wing of Hamas, and investigations of the bureaucratic behemoth are afoot. So are lawsuits.
In Delaware on Friday, survivors of the attack on October 7 filed a federal lawsuit against Unrwa USA, the organization’s 501(c)(3) charity that supports Unrwa, including fundraising. The lawsuit is the second filed in an American court seeking accountability for Unrwa’s involvement in the massacres that Hamas members perpetrated on October 7 in Israel.
The lawsuit was filed by a number of lawyers, led by Mark Goldfeder of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, Arsen Ostrovsky, a leading advocate of fighting anti-Israel terror, the attorney David Schoen, and others.
The American charity has given at least $3.8 million, making it the largest private donor to Unrwa. According to the complaint, Unrwa USA is a 501(c)(3) charity that supports the work of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine “through fundraising, education, and advocacy in the United States.”
The lawsuit alleges that Unrwa USA materially supported terrorism by knowingly, actively, and systematically using their charity “ to operate a terrorist-financing scheme in violation of federal law.” It follows explosive evidence of Unrwa staff participating in the murder and abductions of both Israelis and Americans, as well as allowing their facilities to be used for Hamas control and command centers, as well as for shielding Hamas’s terror tunnels.
Plaintiffs in the case include survivors who fled for their lives from waves of attacking terrorists; relatives of those who did not survive the massacre; displaced families whose homes were destroyed; and victims such as Lishay Lavi, whose husband Omri Miran was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists after they broke into their home in Kibbutz Nahal Oz. The plaintiffs seek unspecified damages and a determination that Unrwa USA breached its legal obligations under federal anti-terror laws.
Mr. Ostrovsky, known for pulling no punches when defending the Jewish State, said that “Unrwa has become an inseparable arm of Hamas and a systematic incubator of hate, incitement, and terror. We are not talking about ‘a few rotten apples.’” In a statement, he added that “The entire organization is rotten to the core…as their primary non-governmental fundraising platform in the United States, Unrwa USA must be held accountable for helping underwrite the mass slaughter, rape and abductions by Hamas on October 7.”
In the same statement, which was made available to the Sun late on Friday, the director of the NJAC, Mr. Goldfeder, stated that “charities generally do good work, but on some very rare occasions, a so-called ‘charity’ is really a front to help finance an international terrorist plot that kills thousands of innocent people. This case involves one of those rare occasions, and that so-called charity — Unrwa USA.”
While there is no doubt that Unrwa is undergoing convulsions in the wake of the calamity of October 7 and ensuing war to stamp out Hamas, it has been around for a long time — since 1949 — and it still has a sizable footprint in the Gaza Strip and in the public sphere. Despite widespread pledges to cut the group’s funding following the “disturbing revelations” about several staffers’ involvement with Hamas — including by the Biden administration — the pendulum may be swinging back in bureaucracy’s favor.
Canada and Sweden, after a pause stemming from the allegations of terror made against Unrwa staff, are each now reportedly resuming their funding. Canada’s international aid minister, Ahmed Hussen, stated on Friday that his country “will be lifting its temporary pause on funding” because in his view “Unrwa plays a vital role in Gaza.”
Therein lies the juggernaut that those who seek to challenge Unwra in the courts might face: namely, that a considerable amount of world opinion is not, to put it mildly, sympathetic to Israel.
But the pressure is clearly on. Earlier this month, more than 8,000 plaintiffs, among which 1,500 dual American-Israeli citizens and 6,500 Israelis, filed a lawsuit demanding permanent defunding of Unrwa.
The noise created by the new lawsuit may itself help to readjust some of those misguided sympathies. The claim notes that “videos from October 7, 2023, show Hamas terrorists, including Unrwa employees, dragging dead bodies and innocent hostages into cars and celebrating and parading Israeli bodies around Gazan cities.”
It also states that it was “a foreseeable part of the conspiracy among the defendant, Unrwa, Hamas, and others, that the funds defendant provided would be used to finance terrorist activities, including, but not limited to the purchase and manufacture of weapons to be used for terrorist purposes; vehicles used for terrorist purposes; the building of tunnels used for terrorist purposes; and to pay members of Hamas, including Unrwa employees, and others to engage in terrorist activities, including the atrocities of October 7, 2023.”
October 7, 2023, marked the deadliest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust.
