Daily Star - Sixty Years Of Unrwa

By Richard Hall
Daily Star staff

BEIRUT: The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) marked its 60th year of operation last year, but far from being an occasion to celebrate, the fact that UNRWA’s temporary mandate is still necessary more than 60 years after its inception is a cause for concern for most. Set up in 1949 to care for Palestinians who had been forced to leave their homes during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, UNRWA provides education, health care, social services and additional support for many of the 4.6 million registered refugees.
There are 422,188 registered Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, as well as an unknown number of non-registered Palestinians who fall outside of the scope of UNRWA. An additional 40,000 Palestinians reside in 42 so-called “gatherings,” or ghettoized neighborhoods consisting of 25 or more Palestinian houses.
As UNRWA enters its sixth decade, The Daily Star looks back at some of the achievements and challenges of the past year.
February 11: UNRWA inaugurated a US-funded Health Center in an adjacent area to the northern Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp.
February 14: UNRWA opens the first of six new school buildings in the northern Bekaa Valley to accommodate an overflow of Palestinian students. The effort was aimed as boosting quality of education and increasing employment opportunities for refugees
March 9: Rebuilding of the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in north Lebanon formally began on this date; 18 months after an army onslaught on Islamist militants reduced the homes of its 30,000 residents to ruins. The foundation stone of the new camp was laid at a ceremony organized by the Lebanese government and UNRWA.
March 16: The United Arab Emirates donated $1 million to UNRWA relief activities for refugees affected by the conflict in Lebanon. The funds will allow UNRWA to construct 149 temporary housing units for Palestinian families who were displaced from the Burj al-Shemali camp in 2007.
June 11: UNRWA Commissioner General Karen Abu Zayd announced the agency’s budget deficit is close to $32 million, and stressed the need to continue financial support to the agency in order to increase and enhance the services it provides to refugees. According to UNRWA, which provides relief services to 4.7 million Palestinian refugees, a $100 million deficit is forecast for the agency’s 2010 budget.
August 31: Reconstruction of Nahr al-Bared is postponed, leading Palestinian authorities to schedule a series of political meetings and stage protests over the weekend. UNRWA received an order to halt all construction works.
It has been reported that the delay could be due to the discovery of Roman ruins underneath the camp site.
September 8: Hundreds of UNRWA employees in south Lebanon staged a one-hour strike on Monday at 1 pm to condemn the organization’s social, health and educational services. The strike, which took place in front of UNRWA’s office in Sidon, was called for by the organization’s labor union in an attempt to improve the services and the amount of job opportunities offered to Palestinian refugees.
December 4: Director of UNRWA Affairs in Lebanon, Salvatore Lombardo, says the agency is struggling with a “dire” financial crisis but will not cut back on its services.
The UNRWA said this month that it was facing its worst budget deficit in history. According to a recent document posted on the agency’s website concerning UNRWA’s financial situation, a shortfall of $79.6 million for 2009 and $125.7 million for 2010 has been projected.
It said a continuing lack of funds since 2005 had “resulted in the complete depletion of UNRWA’s working capital.”