4-Jul-12: What is it about UNRWA?

We have written here multiple times in condemnation of UNRWA. That's the refugee agency invented by the United Nations and the Arab states specifically for the Palestinian Arabs. Its unstated agenda: to ensure the Palestinian Arabs remain classified as "refugees" in the global public consciousness for as long as possible, with zero regard to the harm - and evil - that follows as a consequence. 

We posted last month about the bizarre basis on which UNRWA's existence is financed [see "5-Jun-12: If there's one single thing about UNRWA that we wish people understood, it's this"]. Back in November 2010 [see "24-Nov-10: Quote of the day"], we referred to how the Palestinian Arabs are right at the top of the list of the world's beneficiaries of foreign aid. They have a multitude of non-governmental organizations today that fail to deliver long-term (or any) benefits while perpetuating what the writer we quoted called "corruption, incompetence and meaningless job creation". Beyond these two postings, there are at least another dozen here on this blog in which we point to the profoundly bad things that have resulted from UNRWA's  existence and activity.

In a detailed and well-documented posting today, the esteemed Elder of Ziyon blog takes aim at the reality of UNRWA's role in the educating of Palestinian Arab children. Like EoZ, we begin with UNRWA's educational mission statement:

“An UNRWA education system which develops the full potential of Palestine Refugees to enable them to be confident, innovative, questioning, thoughtful, tolerant and open minded,upholding human values and religious tolerance, proud of their Palestine identity and contributing positively to the development of their society and the global community”.

The reality bears no resemblance to the decent values recited above. Based on actual, online instances of Arabic-language websites bearing the official UNRWA logo, funded by UNRWA, and advancing an overtly Islamist agenda, you can see that the educational system they are sustaining may aspire to religious tolerance, but the reality is very, very different. A handful of EoZ's examples:

• The UNRWA jobs website is currently advertising for teachers to serve in Gaza. It seeks only two specific subjects of expertise: English and what is termed "religious education". Review the curricula, sample exams and other insights into this "religious education" and you quickly understand (perhaps it was already obvious to you) that this is all about one religion, and a particularly malevolent expression of it.
• The Maghazi Prep School for Girls boasts its explicitly Quranic agenda. The school's vision is to see to it that the girls raise a generation of children ready to "defend their country."
• A lesson from the Nusseirat Primary School website on honoring one's parents quotes Quranic and other Islamic sources bewailing "the news of Muslims in Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan... you who wish to join the ranks of the Mujahideen and Jihad with them against the Jews and the Crusaders".
• A recent photo essay and another from last May depicts an UNRWA school observing what it calls Quran Day, celebrating children who memorized the Quran. 
• UNRWA social studies sites expound on the importance of Jerusalem to Muslims and Christians. The significant to Jews? Look elsewhere.
• EoZ links to a poem about the "rape" of Palestine by the Zionists; essays about the beauty of becoming a martyr; stories of young men who asked their parents for permission to wage jihad and who died heroically. 

It goes on, all of it enabled by UNRWA's budgets, support, facilitation and existence. In EoZ's words, all these places and activities "directly contradict what UNRWA's stated educational standards are". His questions are sharp, and lack acceptable answers: 

• Should the UN be in the Islamic education business? 
• How much of UNRWA's budget goes towards "religious education?" 
• Are Western donors to UNRWA even aware that they are funding these lessons?
• Shouldn't someone ask UNRWA about this?

We'll take this opportunity to ask once again the question we posed in June. If (to borrow the laughable claims made by its many supporters) UNRWA's work is so important, if it brings us closer to peace, if it restores dignity to the lives of dispossessed and destitute Arabs, then why, when you look at the top twenty list of donors to this agency that exists entirely from donations, do you see that only one is Arab (and that's not a state but the Islamic Development Bank).

What is it about UNRWA that the Arab states understand better than the nations and tax-payers of the West?