Daesh tries to stage comeback amid rising US-Iran tensions
American troops in Iraq had to pause their operations against Daesh for nearly two weeks amid the tensions
Updated 29 January 2020
AP
BEIRUT: The Daesh group’s self-styled “caliphate” across parts of Iraq and Syria seemed largely defeated last year, with the loss of its territory, the killing of its founder in a US raid and an unprecedented crackdown on its social media propaganda machine.
But tensions between the US and Iran and the resulting clash over the US military presence in the region provide a comeback opportunity for the extremist group, whose remnants have been gradually building up a guerrilla campaign over the past year, experts say.
American troops in Iraq had to pause their operations against Daesh for nearly two weeks amid the tensions. From the other side, Iranian-backed Iraqi militiamen who once focused on fighting the militants have turned their attention to evicting US troops from the Middle East.
In the meantime, Daesh group sleeper cells intensified ambushes in Iraq and Syria in the past few weeks, killing and wounding dozens of their opponents in both countries. Activists and residents say the attacks have intensified since the US killed top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani in a Jan. 3 drone strike at Baghdad’s airport.
It is not clear whether the uptick is related to the repercussions that followed from the strike, and it is possible some of the attacks had been planned before Soleimani’s killing. US officials deny seeing any particular increase in Daesh activities. “They haven’t taken advantage of it, as far as we can see,” said James Jeffrey, the State Department envoy to the international coalition fighting Daesh.
HIGHLIGHTS
• On Jan. 14, Daesh launched a cross border attack from Syria into Iraq, killing an Iraqi officer.
• A day later, Daesh attacked Iraqi force in Salaheddine, killing two soldiers and wounding five.
• Two days later, an Iraqi intelligence major was killed in a car bomb north of Baghdad.
Mervan Qamishlo, a spokesman for Syria’s US-backed Kurdish-led force, said the intensification of Daesh attacks began even earlier, since October, when Turkey began a military operation against Kurdish fighters in northern Syria.
Still, the militants clearly gained at least temporary breathing room as the killing of Soleimani, along with a senior Iraqi militia leader, brought Iran and the US to the brink of all-out war and outraged Iraqis, who considered the strike a flagrant breach of sovereignty.
On Jan. 5, Iraq’s Parliament called for the expulsion of the 5,200 US troops from the country who have been there since 2014 on a mission to train Iraqi forces and assist in the fight against Daesh. The US-led coalition then put the fight against Daesh on hold to focus on protecting its troops and bases. It said last week that it had resumed those operations after a 10-day halt.
“This tension will for sure help Daesh, as all forces fighting it become busy with other matters,” warned Abdullah Suleiman Ali, a Syrian researcher who focuses on terror groups.
Among other things, he said Iran-US tensions help give Daesh the opportunity to restructure as its new leader, Abu Ibrahim Al-Hashimi Al-Qurayshi, strengthens his grip. Al-Qurayshi was announced in the post after longtime leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi was killed by a US raid in Syria in October.
“The day the American-Iranian clash began, Daesh started intensifying its attacks,” said Rami Aburrahman, who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor.
On Jan. 14, Daesh launched a cross-border attack from Syria into Iraq, killing an Iraqi officer. A day later, Daesh fighters attacked an Iraqi force in the central Salaheddine region, killing two soldiers and wounding five. Two days later, an Iraqi intelligence major was killed in a car bomb north of Baghdad.
One of the deadliest attacks occurred in Syria on Jan. 14, when Daesh fighters stole some 2,000 cattle from a village near the eastern town of Mayadeen. One of the four shepherds that own the cattle informed authorities, and a Syrian regime force was sent to the area, where they were met by Daesh fire.
As the forces returned to their base, Daesh gunmen laid an ambush, killing 11 troops and pro-regime fighters as well as two shepherds.
Daesh published photos showing bodies of soldiers said to have been killed in the attack, along with a destroyed armored vehicle and an overturned truck.
On the same day, seven shepherds were found shot dead west of the eastern city of Deir Ezzor. On Jan. 4, 21 shepherds were found shot in the back of their heads, their hands were tied behind their backs.
Dozens of members of the US-backed Kurdish-led Syrian democratic Forces have been killed over the past months in attacks claimed by Daesh as well.
With the painful strikes, Daesh is “taking advantage to boost its influence” and send a message to their supporters that they are still strong, said Omar Abu Laila, an activist from Deir Ezzor now based in Europe.
“Some civilians don’t dare leave their homes after sunset because of fear of Daesh,” Abu Laila said.
The group is also trying to restore its presence on social media and the Internet — a key component to its ability to raise financial support from abroad and recruit new fighters.
Daesh members and supporters have for years sown fear and projected power with the grisly videos they released on social media showing beheadings, amputations and victims burned to death or thrown from buildings.
In recent weeks, European authorities, coordinated by Europol, have shut down thousands of Daesh propaganda platforms and communication channels in an unprecedented crackdown. In particular, the crackdown forced Daesh’s news agency and other channels off the Telegram text messaging system, the group’s primary outlet since 2015.
“The Europol campaign of November had a massive impact on Daesh support networks on Telegram,” said Amarnath Amarasingam, a terrorism researcher at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada.
Since then, the extremists have shifted to other messaging platforms including the Russia-based TamTam, Canada-based Hoop Messenger and BCM Messenger. They also tried to get back on Twitter using hacked accounts, Amarasingam said.
So far, those efforts have not been very successful as international authorities work to chase them down on those outlets as well.
“None of this is really matching the presence they had on Telegram from 2015 onwards,” Amarasingam said.
Two flash bombs fired into garden of Netanyahu's home in north Israel
Israel's President Isaac Herzog condemned the incident in a post on X and said an investigation was underway
Updated 8 sec ago
Reuters
CAIRO: Two flash bombs were fired towards Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's home in the northern Israeli town of Caesarea on Saturday and fell into the garden, police said.
Neither Netanyahu nor his family were present and there was no damage reported, it added in a statement.
Israel's President Isaac Herzog condemned the incident in a post on X and said an investigation was underway.
"The incitement against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu crosses all boundaries. Throwing a flash bomb into his house tonight is crossing another red line," Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir also said on X.
In October, a drone was launched towards the premier's home in Caesarea, without causing any harm.
To the north, Israeli forces have been trading fire with Lebanon's armed Hezbollah group since October, 2023. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Saturday's incident.
Tunisia migrant advocate held in first ‘terrorism’ probe: rights group
Tunisia is one of the main launching points for boats carrying migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean to seek better lives in Europe
Updated 16 November 2024
AFP
TUNIS: A prominent Tunisian advocate for migrants is in custody and his case being handled by anti-terrorist investigators, a disturbing first for the country, the head of a rights group said Saturday.
Tunisia is one of the main launching points for boats carrying migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean to seek better lives in Europe.
Abdallah Said, a Tunisian of Chadian origin, was questioned along with the secretary general and treasurer of his association, Children of the Medenine Moon, said Romdhane Ben Amor, spokesman for the Tunisian Forum for Social and Economic Rights (FTDES).
Two officers of a bank handling the association’s accounts were also detained, he said.
Ben Amor described as “a dangerous signal” the transfer of the case to anti-terrorist investigators “because it’s the first time authorities have used this against associations specializing in migration issues.”
La Presse newspaper, which is close to the government, reported that “five activists operating on behalf of an association in Medenine were in custody in order to be referred to anti-terrorism investigators.”
The newspaper said the association is suspected of receiving foreign funds “to assist sub-Saharan migrants to enter illegally onto Tunisian soil.”
Ben Amor called Said’s detention part of “a new wave of even tougher repression” against migration activists after an earlier crackdown in May.
“It’s a message to all those working in solidarity with the migrants,” he said.
In May, President Kais Saied lashed out at organizations that defend the rights of migrants, calling their leaders “traitors and mercenaries.”
The president reiterated that Tunisia must not become “a country of transit” for migrants and asylum seekers.
Saied, re-elected in October in a vote with turnout of 28.8 percent, made a sweeping power grab in 2021 and critics accuse him of ushering in a new authoritarian regime.
Under a 2023 agreement, the European Union has provided funds to Tunisia in exchange for help with curbing small-boat crossings to Europe.
EU funding rules state all money should be spent in a way that respects fundamental rights, but reports have since emerged of migrants being beaten, raped and mistreated in Tunisian custody.
What Trump’s picks for key foreign-policy roles mean for the Middle East
Likely impact of Republican president’s return to power becoming clearer with naming of nominees
Frustrated by Joe Biden’s inaction on Gaza, many Arab American voters abandoned the Democratic Party
Updated 27 min 42 sec ago
Jonathan Gornall
LONDON: On Nov. 5 many Arab Americans, disenchanted with the Biden administration’s failure to curb Israel’s deadly military interventions in Gaza and Lebanon, abandoned their traditional support for the Democratic party and voted in record numbers for Donald Trump.
As revealed by an Arab News/YouGov poll in the run-up to the US presidential election, Arab Americans believed that Trump would be more likely than Kamala Harris to successfully resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict — even though he was seen as more supportive of Israel’s government than his opponent.
They also felt that Trump would be at least as good for the Middle East in general as Kamala Harris.
Now, however, as Trump reveals his picks for the key roles in his administration, it is becoming clearer what impact that protest vote might have on the Middle East, and on Palestinians.
A billboard that displays a photo of US President-elect Donald Trump is projected a day after the US election, in Tel Aviv, Israel, on Nov. 6, 2024. (AP)
Some of the hires will have to be approved by Senate hearings. But amid talk that Trump’s team is planning to bypass vetting by making so-called recess appointments, many of the choices have raised eyebrows in Washington.
In terms of what Trump’s new team might mean for the Middle East in general, it is perhaps enough to know that Israel is celebrating both Trump’s victory and his picks for key positions.
“Some of the announcements,” commented The Jerusalem Post, “like a new ambassador to the UN and Israel, as well as for an incoming national security adviser and special envoy to the Middle East, are all positive developments in terms of shaping a team that will be supportive of Israel, and strong in the face of adversaries, such as Iran.”
According to a CNN report, current and former US officials have cautioned against assuming that the intelligence community is uniformly opposed to Trump. Across the 18 agencies that include thousands of analysts and operators, there are plenty who support him and likely welcome his return.
Marco Rubio — Secretary of State
The appointment of Rubio, a Florida Republican senator known for his advocacy of a muscular US foreign policy, appears at odds with Trump’s oft-professed intention to see America withdraw from its role as the world’s policeman.
One of the “20 core promises to make America great again” in his Agenda 47 manifesto was a pledge to “strengthen and modernize our military, making it, without question, the strongest and most powerful in the world.”
Marco Rubio. (AP photo)
On the other hand, Trump has promised to ensure that “our government uses that great strength sparingly, and only in clear instances where our national interests are threatened.”
In 2016, when he ran against Trump for the Republican presidential nomination, Rubio repeatedly criticized his rival’s isolationist foreign policy, saying “a world without our engagement is not a world we want to live in.
Rubio, a former member of the Foreign Relations Committee and the Select Committee on Intelligence, doubtless brings a great deal of foreign-policy experience to the Trump team, along with a reputation for being a hawk, ready to take a hard line on Iran and China.
He also brings a strong commitment to Israel.
In footage of a 2023 confrontation between Rubio and activists of the group CODEPINK in Washington, Rubio replied, when asked if he would support a ceasefire, “No I will not,” adding “I want (Israel) to destroy every element of Hamas.”
Pressed to say if he cared about “the babies that are getting killed every day,” he replied: “I think it’s terrible, and I think Hamas is 100 percent to blame.”
Following Iran’s missile attack on Israel in October — carried out in retaliation for Israel’s killing of Hamas leader Ismael Haniyeh in Tehran — Rubio defended Israel's “right to respond disproportionately.”
Israel, he added, “should respond to Iran the way the US would respond if some country launched 180 missiles at us.”
In a tweet on Wednesday after his nomination was confirmed, Rubio said he would work to carry out Trump’s foreign policy agenda and under his leadership “we will deliver peace through strength and always put the interests of Americans and America above all else.”
Pete Hegseth. (Reuters photo)
Pete Hegseth — Secretary of Defense
Many in Washington — and everyone in the Pentagon — are still trying to digest the news that the new man chosen to be in charge of America’s vast military machine is a 44-year-old presenter on Fox News, Trump’s favorite TV channel.
Hegseth, a co-host of the program “Fox & Friends Weekend” who has regularly interviewed Trump on the show, has been a staunch critic of “wokeness” in the military, demanding the sacking of any “general, admiral, whatever” involved in promoting the previous Democratic administrations’ agenda of diversity, equality and inclusivity.
Furthermore, he has spoken out in defense of US soldiers accused of war crimes committed in the region, condemning “the betrayal of the men who keep us free” in his latest book, “The War on Warriors.”
During Trump’s first term in office, he lobbied successfully for presidential pardons for three US soldiers who had been charged with, or had already been found guilty of, war crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Hegseth’s on-the-ground military experience has given him a grunt’s perspective on warfare. He rose to the rank of major in the Minnesota National Guard and served tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. But according to a statement from Paul Rieckhoff, founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, he is “undoubtedly the least qualified nominee for (defense secretary) in American history, and the most overtly political.”
Former Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger, himself a veteran, was more direct. Hegseth’s nomination, he said, is “the most hilariously predictably stupid thing” that Trump could have done.
Or dangerous. Clues to Hegseth’s worldview can be found among the many tattoos he sports. They include the 11th-century Latin Crusader rallying cry “Deus Vult,” “God wills it,” alongside a large “Jerusalem cross,” the symbol adopted by the Crusaders who sacked Jerusalem in 1099, slaughtering tens of thousands of Muslims and Jews in the city.
In the US the symbol is associated with far-right white nationalist movements. In 2016 Hegseth, then in the national guard, was withdrawn from guard duty at Biden’s inauguration because of the tattoo.
Steven Witkoff. (Getty Images via AFP)
Steven Witkoff — Special Middle East envoy
A real-estate tycoon and a long-time friend and golfing buddy of Trump’s, Witkoff has no diplomatic experience but is an uncompromising friend of Israel.
When President Biden paused weapons shipments to Israel in May because of concerns about Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, Witkoff responded by raising millions of dollars for Trump’s presidential campaign from wealthy US Jewish donors.
After attending Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress in July, Witkoff told Fox News “it was spiritual … it was epic to be in that room.”
Witkoff has no known experience of diplomacy or the Middle East. Nevertheless, Trump said in a statement, “Steve will be an unrelenting Voice for PEACE, and make us all proud.”
Witkoff will now be point man for Trump’s two big unfulfilled ambitions for the Middle East: an Israel-Palestine peace deal and normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia.
The Kingdom has made clear that the latter is dependent upon meaningful progress toward sovereignty for the Palestinian people. Witkoff’s views on that are currently unknown, but it seems unlikely they would differ greatly from those of others in the new administration for whom the creation of a Palestinian state is anathema.
Mike Huckabee. (Getty Images via AFP))
Mike Huckabee — Ambassador to Israel
Of all Trump’s appointments, the one that has been received most rapturously in Israel is the naming of the former governor of Arkansas as America’s new ambassador to the country.
The appointment is seen by the Netanyahu government as a sign not only that the new administration will allow Israel to continue its provocative settlements campaign in the occupied territories, but also that Trump is giving the green light to plans for the full annexation of the West Bank.
Huckabee has always been a staunch defender of Israel. He once said there was “no such thing as a Palestinian,” suggesting the term was nothing more than a “political tool to try and force land away from Israel.”
He has taken part in at least two cornerstone-laying ceremonies at new Israeli settlements in occupied East Jerusalem. At one he attended in 2017 he said there was “no such thing as a settlement. They’re communities, they’re neighborhoods, they’re cities. There’s no such thing as an occupation.”
Unsurprisingly, his appointment has been welcomed by far-right Israeli ministers, including Itamar Ben-Gvir, the national security minister who has led repeated provocative incursions by extremist settlers into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who sent congratulations to “a consistent and loyal friend.”
On Monday Smotrich said Trump’s victory represented an “important opportunity” to “apply Israeli sovereignty to the settlements in Judea and Samaria,” the Jewish biblical names for parts of the West Bank. The year 2025, he added, “will, with God’s help, be the year of sovereignty in Judea and Samaria.”
Elise Stefanik. (Getty Images via AFP)
Elise Stefanik — Ambassador to the UN
A decade ago, aged 30, Stefanik was the youngest member of Congress. Since then, she has drifted from the center of the Republican party to the right. In the process, she has become a strong supporter of Trump, defending his attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election result and describing those arrested for their part in the assault on the Capital as “Jan. 6 hostages.”
She has also been a vocal ally of Israel, which she has visited many times.
In 2023 she won praise from the US Jewish community for her aggressive questioning during a congressional hearing of college leaders, whom she accused of turning a blind eye to antisemitism during campus protests.
In March, she was honored for her stance at the Zionist Organization of America’s “Heroes of Israel” gala, where she was given the “Dr. Miriam and Sheldon Adelson Defender of Israel Award.”
In her acceptance speech, Stefanik criticized Joe Biden’s “unconscionable actions and words that undermine the Israeli war effort.” She would, she said, “always be committed to supporting Israel’s right to defend itself … and I will continue to stand with Israel to ensure (it has) the resources it needs in this darkest hour.”
On Thursday the UN Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices Affecting the Human Rights of the Palestinian People and Other Arabs of the Occupied Territories found that “Israel’s warfare in Gaza is consistent with the characteristics of genocide, with mass civilian casualties and life-threatening conditions intentionally imposed on Palestinians there.”
As US ambassador, Stefanik — who has been openly critical of the UN for what she calls its “entrenched antisemitic bias” — will be perfectly positioned to push back against such claims.
The Washington Post predicted that Stefanik “will use her position at the United Nations to assail UN agencies and diplomats over any criticism of Israel, and air long-standing Republican grievances over the workings of the world’s most important multilateral institution.”
Michael Waltz. (Getty Images via AFP)
Michael Waltz — National Security Adviser
Florida Congressman Waltz, a former colonel in the US Army with multiple tours of Afghanistan and Iraq and four Bronze Stars to his name, is one of the few top-level Trump hires who brings relevant expertise to his new job.
A former special forces Green Beret, he served as a defense policy director for secretaries of state Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates — and navigating Washington’s corridors of power is a skill that runs in the family.
His wife is Julia Nesheiwat, the daughter of Jordanian immigrants who came to America in the 1950s. She is a former captain in the US Army’s Intelligence Corps and served in Afghanistan and Iraq. She also held national security roles in the Bush, Obama and previous Trump administrations.
Waltz is a member of the Kurdish-American Caucus in Congress, which “promotes knowledge and understanding of the Kurds, a distinct group of over 30 million living in Iraq, Turkey, Iran, Syria, the US and elsewhere globally.”
The Caucus believes that Kurdistan is “a beacon of stability and security in Iraq, deserves strong US support,” and is “a vital ally in protecting US interests in Iraq and the entire region.” Iraqi Kurdistan, it says, is not only “vital to any vision of a peaceful and prosperous Iraq,” but also “critically serves as a break in the crescent from Iran to Lebanon.”
Waltz’s appointment, the Kurdistan 24 network commented, is “very good news for the Kurds.”
Tulsi Gabbard. (Getty Images via AFP)
Tulsi Gabbard — Director of National Intelligence
In October 2019, presidential candidate Hillary Clinton suggested that Gabbard, who at the time was a Democrat and a rival for the party’s backing, was being “groomed” by Russia, and that her foreign policy views echoed Russian interests.
Since then, the former Democratic congresswomen has switched sides, becoming an independent in 2022 and joining the Republicans this year.
Clinton’s unproven accusation is all the more startling now that 43-year-old Gabbard is about to be put in charge of more than a dozen intelligence agencies, from the FBI to the CIA.
Like many of Trump’s picks, Gabbard is a military veteran. She served in the Hawaii Army National Guard with tours of duty in Iraq and Kuwait. In Iraq from 2004 to 2005 she was part of a medical unit, where, she has said, “every single day, I was confronted with the very high human cost of war.” That experience, she added, shaped her outlook on America’s military adventures.
“I was not the same person when I came home from that war as I was when I left,” she said, “and it’s why I am so deeply committed to doing everything I possibly can to making sure that not a single one of our men and women in uniform, not another service member, has their life sacrificed in the pursuit of wars that have nothing to do with keeping the American people safe.”
On the campaign trail in 2019 she became known as the “anti-war presidential hopeful,” criticizing the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan for having taken “trillions of dollars out of our pockets for health care, infrastructure, education, for clean energy.” America, she said, must “end these wasteful regime-change wars.”
That, however, was then. Gabbard is, after all, no stranger to U-turns, having abandoned the Democrats for the Republicans. In a cabinet full of hawks such as Marco Rubio talking tough on China and Iran, it remains to be seen if the head of the world’s biggest spy machine is still keen to rein America in.
John Ratcliffe. (Getty Images via AFP)
John Ratcliffe — Director of CIA
John Ratcliffe, a former representative from Texas, has been chosen by Trump to serve as the CIA director. He currently serves as co-chair at the Center for American Security at the America First Policy Institute, a Trump-linked think tank. Ratcliffe served as the director of national intelligence from 2020 to 2021 during Trump’s first term. A CNN report said Ratcliffe “is seen as a largely professional and potentially less disruptive choice than some other former officials believed to have been under consideration.”
Alina Habba. (Getty Images via AFP)
Alina Habba — Trump attorney
Alina Saad Habba, a senior Trump adviser and attorney, said she was not considering the role of press secretary, for which she was hotly tippled before it went to Karoline Leavitt on Friday. An American lawyer and managing partner of a law firm based in New Jersey, Habba has been a legal spokesperson for Trump since 2021 and a senior adviser for MAGA, Inc., Trump’s Super PAC. Her parents were Chaldean Catholics who emigrated from Iraq to the US in the early 1980s.
Italy sends more than 15 tonnes of humanitarian aid to Gaza
Italy is committed to de-escalation of the Palestinian conflict, defense minister says
Updated 16 November 2024
Reuters AFP
ROME: An Italian Air Force plane took off on Saturday carrying more than 15 tonnes of humanitarian aid to be delivered to the population in Gaza, a Defense Ministry statement said.
The aid aboard the C-130J aircraft, which departed from the central Italian city of Pisa, had been collected by the charity group Confederazione Nazionale delle Misericordie d’Italia, the statement said.
“Italy is doing and will continue to do everything possible to alleviate the suffering of the civilian population in Gaza,” said Defense Minister Guido Crosetto, adding Italy did not forget those who are suffering and was committed to a de-escalation of the conflict.
The plane will fly to Larnaca airport in Cyprus, after which all its materials will be transferred to Gaza.
Earlier this year, Italy launched a flagship initiative dubbed Food for Gaza to help civilians there, and it has sent several consignments of aid to those hit by the war ravaging the Palestinian enclave.
Also on Saturday, the Health Ministry in Gaza said that at least 43,799 people had been killed in more than 13 months of war.
The toll includes 35 deaths in the previous 24 hours, according to the ministry, which said 103,601 people have been wounded in the Gaza Strip since the war began when militants attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
The Oct. 7 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to a tally of Israeli official figures.
Vowing to stop militants from regrouping in north Gaza, Israel in October, this year began a major air and ground assault there.
The Israeli army said earlier on Saturday that its troops continued “their operational activity” in the northern areas of Jabalia and Beit Lahia.
The military said “over the past day, the troops continued to operate in the Rafah area, eliminating numerous terrorists, dismantling terrorist infrastructure sites, and locating a large amount of weapons in the area” in the territory’s south.
Uncertainty ahead for UN training center students in West Bank
Jonathan Fowler, UNRWA spokesman in Jerusalem, warned that if some of the services could not continue, the socioeconomic consequences could be “potentially disastrous”
Updated 16 November 2024
AFP
QALANDIA: In the crowded Qalandia refugee camp, UNRWA’s training center is an island of calm where young people from the occupied West Bank master trades, but a recent Israeli ban on all cooperation with the UN agency has left the center in limbo.
On the spacious campus, a stone’s throw from the wall that separates the West Bank and Israel, plumbers in training assemble pipes, future electricians wire circuits, and carpenters hammer together roof frames.
But how long these scenes will last is an open question after Israel last month banned UNRWA, founded in 1949, from operating on Israeli soil or coordinating with Israeli authorities.
BACKGROUND
Baha Awaad, the school’s principal, says it trains 350 students but cannot provide for more due to the lack of permission to expand buildings.
UNRWA’s ban in Israel and occupied East Jerusalem has raised fears that its West Bank employees could face problems not only accessing those areas but also moving around more generally because they would lose the ability to coordinate with the Israeli authorities manning checkpoints.
The same fears apply to visas and permits delivered by Israeli authorities.
Eighteen-year-old Ahmed Naseef, a refugee from the Jalazone camp north of nearby Ramallah, said he did not know what he and his classmates would do should the Qalandia training center close as a result of the law.
“It would disrupt my fellow students. Many don’t have the financial means to study at another institute. Here, it’s almost free,” he said during a class where he was learning how to install lights in a room.
“We imagine that we’re setting up a bedroom and a bathroom, installing lights, outlets, and power points,” said the student, who has been a trainee for two months after graduating high school.
“If it closes, I might consider going to university,” he said, adding that this had been his original intention, but his current circumstances “don’t allow for that.”
Jonathan Fowler, UNRWA spokesman in Jerusalem, warned that if some of the services could not continue, the socioeconomic consequences could be “potentially disastrous.”
“If these services are not able to operate ... who is going to provide education for the children and the adolescents in this camp?“
Baha Awaad, the school’s principal, said it trains 350 students but cannot provide for more due to the lack of permission to expand buildings.
Asked whether the students could finish their school year, Awaad admitted: “Frankly, we don’t know.”
“We’re operating as usual, not wanting to spread fear. We reassure students that we’re doing our best to continue teaching here,” he said, adding that worried students had already approached him.
As for what would happen should the school close, Awaad said: “That depends. They’ll be left without options if it’s a permanent closure.”
Fowler said there was no sustainable alternative to his agency’s varied work on such a large scale.
“You can’t just flick a switch, and UNRWA disappears and someone else steps in,” he said.
“The law is very unclear on many fronts,” he continued, so “what the intention is, how that would be operationalized is extremely uncertain.”
Tensions between UNRWA and Israel began after Israel accused about a dozen of the agency’s staff of taking part in Hamas’s unprecedented attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
A series of probes found some “neutrality-related issues” at UNRWA.
They determined that nine employees “may have been involved” in the Oct. 7 attack but found no evidence for Israel’s central allegations.
A quarter of the West Bank’s 912,000 refugees live in 19 camps, according to UNRWA, and many rely on various services provided by the agency’s 3,800 West Bank staff.
One such recipient, teenager Naseef, graduated from a UNRWA school and received health care from one of its clinics.
In his camp, he said: “The situation is especially hard for the clinic, which many people rely on for medications and treatments. If it shuts down, they’ll be cut off.”
Back in Qalandia camp’s narrow alleys, among murals of deceased Palestinian fighters, a nurse at the crowded UNRWA clinic said there was no viable alternative for residents should her facility close.
At the nearby UNRWA primary school for girls, headmaster Rana Nabhan said she “doesn’t know” whether her students will finish the school year.
Unaware of the challenges, a crowd of giggling schoolgirls run around in bright-colored bibs during gym class, bringing the courtyard to life.
Just over their shoulders is another mural in Arabic: “I love my beautiful school,” it reads.
