EXCLUSIVE: As Israeli bulldozers razed structures at UNRWA headquarters on Tuesday after Israel passed legislation last year banning the organization’s activities on Israeli soil, a new documentary sheds light on the controversial UN agency for its close relationship with Hamas terrorists and its lax control over teaching anti-Semitism to generations of its students.
UNRWA Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini condemned the action against the UNRWA buildings, calling it a violation of international law, while Israeli officials said the compound had not been actively used and the demolition was carried out in accordance with Israeli law.
The development comes weeks after the United Nations General Assembly voted to extend UNRWA’s mandate through 2029, despite growing opposition and abstentions from several Western countries. The extension followed months of controversy surrounding the agency after Israeli authorities provided videos showing UNRWA staff taking part in the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led massacre. These allegations remain under investigation and UNRWA has said it has dismissed several staff members in response to the allegations.
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During the war in Gaza, the Israeli military has also discovered weapons, tunnel shafts and other Hamas infrastructure in UNRWA facilities, including schools.
Heavy machinery works as Israeli forces dismantle the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) headquarters in Jerusalem, January 20, 2026. (Ammar Awad/Reuters)
Last October, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking to reporters in Israel, reiterated the Trump administration’s policies toward the UN and UNRWA. “The United Nations is here. They are on the ground. We are willing to work with them if they can make it work, but not UNRWA. UNRWA has become a subsidiary of Hamas.”
The new documentary entitled “Unravel UNRWA” now draws renewed attention to the agency’s structure, history and political role.
The film examines UNRWA from its founding in 1949 to its current activities. It features interviews with refugees, Arab and Israeli voices, as well as former UNRWA officials.
Participants in the film argue that UNRWA has long promoted UN General Assembly Resolution 194, a 1948 measure that Palestinians interpret as giving refugees and their descendants the right to return to homes in Israel, an idea the documentary shows has helped perpetuate refugee status rather than resolve it.
A man stands in Gaza with the help of UNRWA. (Reuters)
Zlatko Zigic, former director of the UN migration agency from 1997 to 2017, says in the film that “the problem of UNRWA is the concept of the endless struggle of Palestinians to return,” adding that enforcing the right of return to Israel “has become a tool to perpetuate the conflict.”
The documentary also includes scenes filmed in UNRWA schools, showing classroom lessons teaching children that they will one day return to countries in Israel. In one scene presented in the film, Jews are referred to as “the wolves,” and a teacher asks elementary school students, “What have the Jews done to us?” before telling them that they had been expelled and deported, that their families had been murdered, and that they should be grateful to UNRWA, which built refugee camps for them.
“The biggest problem in terms of surveillance, I’m pretty sure, probably has to do with the local authorities, in this case we’re talking about Gaza, so we’re talking about Hamas,” Lindsay said. “The people who work for UNRWA are subject, yes, to UNRWA, but more importantly they are subject to local authorities,” in this case Hamas.
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A Palestinian boy walks near an UNRWA school hosting displaced persons hit during an overnight Israeli attack in Gaza City, July 5, 2025. (Dawoud Abu Alkas/Reuters)
Lindsay said that while donor governments may see detailed paperwork and reporting, the reality on the ground can look very different.
He said that UNRWA leadership historically had not tried to ban Hamas members from their work, arguing that the organization viewed Hamas as part of Palestinian political life.
“UNRWA has made no effort to keep Hamas out,” Lindsay said. “The position of the commissioners general was that UNRWA has no problem with Hamas.”
He described an environment in which local staff and contractors faced heavy pressure from Hamas, creating incentives to comply rather than risk reprisals.
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An IDF infographic describing what it claims are the UNRWA workers who participated in the October 7 massacre. (IDF Spokespersons Unit)
“If Hamas comes to you and says, we might want 5% of the concrete you use, or maybe you need to show that 5% more food was distributed than was actually there, you don’t say no,” he said. “If you don’t do what Hamas says, you won’t be fired. Very bad things will happen to you.”
Lindsay said this reality rarely reaches senior international staff, who make up only a small portion of UNRWA’s workforce in Gaza.
“In Gaza you are talking about perhaps 12,000 to 13,000 staff, of whom perhaps 25 are real internationals,” he said.
He said that over time, many humanitarian workers have developed “clientitis,” a phenomenon in which aid agencies begin to identify politically with the populations they serve.
This photo, taken during a media tour organized by the Israeli army on February 8, 2024, shows Israeli soldiers in an evacuated complex of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in Gaza City. (Jack Guez/AFP via Getty Images)
“Humanitarian organizations have come to identify with the people they provide humanitarian aid to,” says Lindsay. “In that case, that means identification with one movement within the Palestinian political scene, namely Hamas.”
Lindsay said he initially believed that UNRWA could be reformed, but later concluded that the agency’s structure made meaningful reform impossible.
“It cannot be reformed in the sense that it should not be reformed by the responsible heads of government,” he said. “It is also difficult to reform UNRWA because UNRWA members have become what the State Department calls clientitis.”
He also criticized the agency’s handling of educational content, saying teachers in UNRWA schools were subject to the same threats and coercion as other staff.
UNRWA headquarters in Gaza City, Gaza on February 21, 2024. (Dawoud Abo Alkas/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“What will people do under a murderous totalitarian government like Hamas?” Lindsay said. “They won’t take their chances.”
Following the General Assembly’s recent vote to extend UNRWA’s mandate, Lindsay said the organization views the outcome as a vote of confidence, but noted that opposition is growing.
“In 2022, there was one vote against the extension of the mandate and ten abstentions,” he said. “Recently there were 10 votes against and 18 abstentions. The movement is against UNRWA because of the things that have been exposed in recent years, especially since October 7, 2023.”
He added that while UNRWA enjoys broad support among UN member states, these countries are not the agency’s main funders.
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A Palestinian boy carries an aid box provided by UNRWA, amid a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, in Gaza City, February 3, 2025. REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
“The vast majority of countries in the UN are anti-Western and certainly pro-UNRWA,” Lindsay said. “But it is the donors who count, because the money all comes from voluntary donations, largely from Western countries, the same countries that are getting nervous. And that, I think, is a real threat to the continuation of UNRWA.”
