Palestinians Protest The Closure of The Sidon UNRWA Office in Lebanon

Palestinian refugees in the Ain al-Hilweh camp escalated their protests against UNRWA Wednesday shuttering their office in Sidon claiming neglect as coronavirus viciously spreads among their camps.

With the coronavirus widespread in the Palestinian camps in Lebanon causing high numbers of deaths and infections, the refugees have started to intensify their steps in protest of UNRWA’s handling of the health situation in what they describe as “neglect,” where a health emergency hasn’t even been declared yet.

The decision was taken during a recent meeting held by the Joint Palestinian Action Committee.

Representative of the committee Fouad Othman told The Daily Star Wednesday that they locked down the office of UNRWA’s director in Sidon as a first step of their escalatory actions "until the organization and its director- general in Lebanon carry out their duties in providing aid to struggling Palestinians."

Lebanon has been witnessing an unprecedented surge in the number of coronavirus infections and deaths for the past month that has left hospitals overwhelmed and the poor more vulnerable as a result of a total lockdown.

A member of the camp’s popular committee Adnan Rifai stressed on the importance of these efforts to pressure UNRWA and force it to bear responsibility of the Palestinian refugees’ suffering.

He called on Commissioner-General of UNRWA Philippe Lazzarini to carry out his duties in full so that the Palestinian people aren’t faced with three options that all result in death: “either die at the gates of hospitals, die from hunger and poverty or die on the “death” boats while trying to flee Lebanon to other countries out of desperation.”

The pandemic in Lebanon has only exacerbated the economic crisis in the country that has pushed more than half the population under the poverty line.

Mahmoud Dahsha, a Palestinian refugee said his people had not experienced this type of hunger, unemployment and poverty even during the height of the Civil War, the multiple security and political crises and the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

“We hold UNRWA responsible for what is happening and they must act before it’s too late,” he said.

UNRWA only provided financial relief to the Palestinians once since the pandemic began last February. The organization made a set of promises it later backed out from, citing financial difficulties that left many families in the camp living in extreme poverty.

“We can’t even have bread and tea because of these high prices,” said Wasfiye al-Ali, pushing her child in a stroller in a vegetable market in Ain al-Hilweh.

UNRWA announced in 2021 that the agency needs around $806 million for its regular services and another $550 million for its emergency and life-saving services in the occupied West Bank and Syria.

Lazzarini has warned that UNRWA is on the edge of financial collapse. Former US President Donald Trump cut off hundreds of millions of dollars in funding to the agency back in 2018; however President Joe Biden’s administration has signaled they will restore aid to Palestinians.

This article has been adapted from its original source.

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