Australia is reinstating funding to a key UN aid agency amid concerns about the worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza, while calling on Israel to allow lifesaving supplies into the besieged territory “now”.
The foreign minister, Penny Wong, announced the decision to unfreeze $6m in emergency funding for Unrwa on Friday, as part of a broader package of support.
Wong also announced that Australia would support airdrops by Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. A Royal Australian Air Force C-17A Globemaster will deliver 140 aerial delivery parachutes.
The government will provide $4m in extra funding to Unicef and $2m to a new UN mechanism to deliver aid into Gaza, bringing Australia’s total humanitarian support since the crisis began to $52.5m.
The head of the general delegation of Palestine to Australia, Izzat Abdulhadi, said it was “a principled and timely step, especially given the increasingly dire and catastrophic humanitarian situation being faced by the Palestinian people in Gaza”.
But the Israeli ambassador to Australia, Amir Maimon, said it was “very disappointing to learn Australia is reinstating funding to the discredited Unrwa, especially before the UN’s own review is finalised later this month”.
Australia was among more than a dozen donor countries to suspend funding to UNRWA in late January, after the Israeli government alleged that 12 UNRWA staff members were involved in the 7 October Hamas-led attacks on Israel.
Friday’s decision to reinstate funding follows similar moves by Canada, Sweden and the European Union.
“Of course it’s a prime consideration in restoring funding to ensure that Australian funding is used appropriately - and we are doing that,” Wong told reporters in Adelaide.
“I would also say it is a prime consideration to recognise that we have children and families who are starving. We have a capacity, along with the international community, to assist them and we know that Unrwa is central and vital to delivering that assistance to the people who need it.”
The “temporary” pause for Unrwa affected $6m in top-up funding that Wong had announced in mid-January, not the $20m in Australia’s core funding for the 2023-24 financial year that was delivered prior to the accusations.
The Australian government repeatedly characterised the allegations against Unrwa staff as “grave” and sought “a clear commitment” that the agency would heed recommendations from multiple investigations into the matter.
Australia had also repeatedly called on Israel to share the underlying evidence.
During the media conference on Friday, Wong was repeatedly pressed to reveal whether Israel had provided all of the evidence. She said only that Israel had provided “some information”.
Wong said Australia had advice that additional safeguards could “sufficiently protect Australian taxpayer funding”.
She said the government’s updated funding agreement with Unrwa would include guarantees of staff neutrality and confidence in supply chains.
The deputy leader of the Greens, Mehreen Faruqi, said the funding was “inexcusably cut off” at a time when children were “being starved in the ruins of Gaza and dying of malnutrition”.
But the Coalition attacked the “reckless” and “irresponsible” decision to reinstate funding “at this time”.
The shadow foreign minister, Simon Birmingham, questioned how the assurances from Unrwa could be enforced and accused the government of “acting out of step with the US”.
The US has not yet resumed funding but the State Department said this week it must “plan for the fact that Congress may make that pause permanent”.
About 85% of the population of Gaza have been displaced, some multiple times, in order to escape Israeli bombardment, while aid groups are increasingly alarmed about famine and poor sanitation.
More than 31,000 Palestinians have been killed since Israel began its military operations in October, including thousands of women and children, according to Gaza heath authorities.
Israel states that its legitimate aim is to “destroy” Hamas and to rescue more than 100 hostages that remain in captivity in Gaza after the militant group’s 7 October attack on southern Israel, when about 1,200 people were killed.
The Israeli government has argued that Unrwa is “part of the problem and will not be part of the solution in the Gaza Strip”.
Wong said the the World Food Programme had advised the Australian government “that there are large stocks of food outside of Gaza’s borders, but there’s no way to move it across the border into Gaza and deliver it at scale without Israel’s cooperation”.
“We implore Israel to allow more aid into Gaza now,” Wong said.
She also renewed calls for the immediate and unconditional release of hostages and “an immediate and enduring humanitarian ceasefire”.
Marc Purcell, the chief executive of the Australian Council for International Development, said children were “already dying of starvation on the world’s watch”.
“Parachuting aid is not a solution. Five civilians have already died in trying to reach air drops in Gaza, and the aid is only reached by those who are fit and able to do so.”
The chief executive of Save the Children Australia, Mat Tinkler, also welcomed the decision to reinstate funding “so that Unrwa can get on with the essential work of saving lives in Gaza”.
The independent MP Zoe Daniel said: “The world cannot withhold funding and subsequently allow full-scale humanitarian collapse.”
The president of the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network, Nasser Mashni, said it was “distressing that funding was frozen in the first place, considering Israel produced no evidence of agency wrongdoing”.
But the president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, Daniel Aghion, said the government’s decision to reinstate the funding was “wrong”.
“The government needs to find another way to feed the Gazans,” Aghion said.
The Zionist Federation of Australia said if the resumption of funding to Unrwa “ultimately strengthens Hamas, as it has in the past, it will only extend this war and the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza”.
“We are also disappointed by the Australian government’s suggestion that Israel is not allowing aid into Gaza,” said the federation’s president, Jeremy Leibler.
