UN Watch released a new report today documenting 12 different Facebook
accounts operated by UNRWA officials (see images below) that openly incite to
antisemitism and terrorism, and urged UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and
UNRWA chief Pierre Krähenbühl to terminate the responsible officials, condemn
the offending posts, and establish a commission of inquiry, comprised of
representatives of top donor states (see chart at right), to investigate the
culture of impunity for perpetrators of racism and incitement that pervades
UNRWA.
“The pattern and practice of
UNRWA school principals, teachers and staff members posting antisemitic and
terror-inciting images suggests a pathology of racism and violence within UNRWA
that must be rooted out, not buried, as UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness has
attempted to do by calling for boycotts of newspapers or NGOs that report these
incidents of hate,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, a
non-governmental Geneva watchdog organization.
“The UN must recognize that
these disgusting posts, published on Facebook accounts run by people who identify
themselves as UNRWA officials, constitute a gross violation of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which prohibits
“incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence,” said Neuer.
“Enough of the UNRWA strategy
of impunity, denial and deflection. It’s time for the perpetrators to be held
to account. They must be fired – immediately.”
UNRWA
officials who should be fired for posting violent & antisemitic images
1. Ahmed Fathi Bader,
identifying himself as a Deputy School Principal at UNRWA (screenshot), posted the photo above (screenshot) and praised the murder of “a group of collaborators with
the Jews,” an incident strongly condemned by Amnesty International and
other human rights groups, saying how much it “pleased” him.
“Shame them in this world, and a painful punishment in the
afterlife.” His UNRWA affiliation is further documented here (and captured here).
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Ahmed Fathi Bader for
using the name of UNRWA on an account that promotes violence and
terrorism.
2. Mohammed Abu
Staita, who identifies himself on Facebook as
working for UNRWA (captured here), posted the
cartoon above (screenshot) on November 8, 2014, depicting a hook-nosed,
black-clad, ultra-Orthodox Jew, with long Chasidic earlocks and a black hat
stamped with a Star of David, cowering behind a tree, as the
tree alerts an excited, gun-wielding Palestinian to the Jew’s
presence.
(The Islamic legend depicted above
features in Article 7 of the Hamas Charter: “The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight
the Jews and kill them, when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The
stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come
and kill him.”)
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Mohammed Abu
Staita for using the name of UNRWA on an account that promotes
violence and terrorism.
3. Ramy Alshorbasy, who identifies himself as a teacher at UNRWA (captured here), last
month posted the above anti-Semitic photo (screenshot), in
which a cabal of cackling ultra-Orthodox Jews, crudely stereotyped
with claws and earlocks, laugh at the fate of Palestinian babies.
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Ramy
Alshorbasy for using the name of UNRWA on an account that promotes
violent anti-Semitism and terrorism.
4. Abed Abuashraf, on the same Facebook account where he identifies himself as an UNRWA official (screenshot), advocates peeling Israel off the world map, to be violently replaced by a Palestinian state, in the two images (captured here andhere) that he posted below, on July 10 and 13, 2014.
5. Wael Sallouh, who identifies himself as working for UNRWA on
his Facebook page (screenshot), posted the photo below (also here) on June 16, 2014, to celebrate the kidnapping,
four days’ prior, of three Israeli teenagers by Hamas terrorists. The
cartoon shows a Palestinian prisoner taunting a frightened and sniveling Israeli
guard by holding up three fingers, the symbol used last year by Palestinians to
celebrate the abduction of the Israeli boys, who were later found murdered.
6. Mohammed A. Elhafi, who identifies himself on Facebook (screenshot) as an employee
at UNRWA, posted this photo (below
and here) condoning violence,
on December 31 2011, in which the word “Fatah” is written so as to incorporate
a rifle. The Arabic caption underneath includes an exhortation to
violence: “long live revolution”.
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Mohammed A.
Elhafi for using the name of UNRWA on an account that promotes
violence and breaches neutrality.
7. Nasreen Hammoud, who on her Facebook page (screenshot) says that she works for UNRWA, uploaded this cartoon (captured here and below), to Facebook on August 2, 2014.
Israel, characterized by a man wearing a bib emblazoned with a Star of
David, is seen feasting on a helpless Palestinian child with the aid of a U.S.
Star-Spangled fork, and drinking his blood. Concern about this post has
already been documented elsewhere, yet it remains active.
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Nasreen Hammoud for
using the name of UNRWA on an account that promotes anti-Semitism and
breaches neutrality.
8. Fala Sala, identifying
himself on Facebook (screenshot) as a teacher at UNRWA schools, posted the image below on May 15, 2014, in which Israel and the
Palestinian territories are depicted as one State of Palestine. (Image also
visible here.)
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Fala Sala for using
the name of UNRWA on an account that breaches neutrality.
9. Mohamad Essa, who identifies
himself as an UNRWA employee on his Facebookpage (screenshot), posted the cartoon below (also captured here) on November 18, 2014, glorifying a gruesome
terrorist attack on a Jerusalem synagogue of the same day. Two
Palestinian men entered the crowded synagogue of Kehilat Bnei Torah,
killing four worshipers at the scene while a further victim, a Druze Israeli
police officer, died of his wounds in hospital.
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Mohamed Essa for
using the name of UNRWA on an account that promotes violence and anti-Semitism.
10. Yousef Matar, a Human Resources
Assistant at UNRWA according to hisFacebook (screenshot), posted a photo (below and also here) on July 10, 2014,
expressing support for an attack in which a rocket was launched towards
Israel from Gaza. In another post, he uploaded a picture (screenshot) condoning
violence, reminding Palestinians of their “duty” of “resistance”.
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Yousef Matar for using
the name of UNRWA on an account that promotes violence and terrorism.
11. Ahmed Dahdouh identifies himself
on his Facebook
page as an employee of UNRWA (screenshot). On April 24, 2012, he uploaded an image of a hooded figure hurling a rock (captured here), as shown below. The caption makes numerous
mention of “revolution”.
Recommendation: UNRWA should fire Ahmed Dahdouh for using
the name of UNRWA on an account that promotes violence and breaches neutrality.
UNRWA Institutional Pages
12. In the image below, the Facebook page of UNRWA Staff in
Syria portrays Jews or Israelis as
baby-killers, with a black figure marked by a Star of David shooting a baby in
Gaza, under the headline “Stop Killing Babies.” UN
Watch has captured the imagehere.
Though Chris Gunness’ strategy is to claim all such pages to be
“impostors,” UNRWA has given tacit if not official approval: the page was
founded in 2013, and is well-known with a following of 16,000 people;
it lists the official UNRWA website of unrwa.org as its website; and
an official UNRWA email address (s.mohyaldeen@unrwa.org, belonging to
UNRWA official Samer Mohy Al Deen).
Recommendation: UNRWA should terminate all of the staff
associated with the “UNRWA Staff in Syria” account, for incitement to hatred
and breach of neutrality.
UNRWA spokesman reacts to evidence of incitement to
antisemitism and violence
Interested to find out more about UN Watch’s political & financial affiliations since its establishment. Can anyone advise? RT
— Chris Gunness (@ChrisGunness) August 26, 2015
#UNWatch makes fool of itself accusing shutdown @UNRWA school of anti-semitism. Credibility dead in water. Will anyone believe them again?
— Chris Gunness (@ChrisGunness) August 25, 2015
