Aid agency UNRWA says it could run out of funding for Gaza in a month

The United Nations Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) said on Monday that it would not be able to continue operations in Gaza and across the region beyond the end of February if funding were not resumed.

A string of countries, including the U.S., Canada and Britain, have paused their funding to the aid agency in the wake of allegations that 12 UNRWA staff were involved in the Oct. 7 attacks led by Hamas in southern Israel.

"If the funding is not resumed, UNRWA will not be able to continue its services and operations across the region, including in Gaza, beyond the end of February," a spokesperson for the agency said.

Several European Union countries paused funding for the agency as well.

The European Commission said on Monday it would review whether it could continue to fund UNRWA. No additional funding for the organization is currently foreseen until the end of February, the commission said.

"On the one hand, we have these extremely serious allegations, and it's obvious that these need to be investigated seriously and without delay," commission spokesman Eric Mamer told reporters.

"Secondly, UNRWA is a partner for humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. We recognize fully that aid to Palestinians needs to continue."

Foreign Minister Israel Katz has called on UNRWA commissioner general Philippe Lazzarini to resign.

Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh has accused Israel of a "premeditated political attack" on the agency, which it has long criticized, and called for restoration of aid funds.

UNRWA, officially called the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, was established in 1949 following the first Arab-Israeli war. It provides services including schooling, primary health care and humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, the occupied West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.

The organization, with an estimated 13,000 staff in Gaza, has said 152 of its employees have been killed in Israel's military response to the Oct. 7 attacks.

LISTEN l CBC's Chris Brown from Jerusalem on an eventful weekend:

The Sunday Magazine17:08The latest on the Israel-Hamas war following ICJ ruling, UNRWA allegations

On Friday, the International Court of Justice ruled that Israel must take steps to prevent genocide in Gaza, but stopped short of ordering a ceasefire in a case brought forward by South Africa. Shortly after, Israel alleged that members of UNRWA, the UNs relief agency for Palestinians, were involved in the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks. CBC News foreign correspondent Chris Brown joins Piya Chattopadhyay from Jerusalem to help explain these latest developments in the Israel-Hamas war.

2 more journalists killed in Gaza

Inside Gaza on Monday, residents reporteddeadly airstrikes on neighbourhoods in Gaza City that also wounded many people.

Among those killed were two Palestinian journalists, Essam El-lulu and Hussein Attalah, along with several members of their families, health officials and the journalist union said.

"The war continues in a dirtier manner," said Gaza City resident Mustafa Ibrahim, a Palestinian human rights activist now displaced with his family in Rafah, near the southern border with Egypt, along with more than a million other Gazans.

Israel, which blames Hamas for the deaths of civilians, ordered new evacuations of the most populated areas of Gaza City, but people said communications blackouts meant many would miss them.

Those that did fleehad to run the gauntlet of Israeli tanks placed on the main north-south road, residents said.

People in the north have been grinding animal feed to make flour after flour, rice and sugar ran out, part of an aid crisis now exacerbated by the withdrawal of supportto UNRWA.

"What is the world waiting for? Animal feed has begun to run out of northern Gaza markets," local journalist Anas Al-Sharif wrote on X. "What will people eat when animal feed runs out?"

Airstrikes also hit the southern city of Khan Younis. Israel said that four among dozens of Palestinian gunmen it had killed in the past 24 hours had been preparing to ambush troops near Al-Amal hospital.

In the middle of Gaza, health officials said 13 Palestinians were killed in the Al-Rimal neighbourhood after Israeli forces stormed a shelter for displaced people there.

The Gaza war has also inflamed violence in the occupied West Bank. Five Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces in four different incidents there in the past 24 hours, the Palestinian health ministry said.

Palestinian officials say 26,422 people have been killed in the response to the Oct. 7 attacks, with thousands more bodies likely under the rubble of destroyed buildings across the coastal territory.

Around 1,200 people were killed during the Hamas-led attacks on Oct. 7, including several Canadians. Israeli officials said 253 others were taken hostage, with about 130 yet to return home after a late-November pause that saw dozens of hostages freed.

Tel Aviv sees rocket fire

Hamas fired a barrage of rockets at Tel Aviv and nearby cities on Monday, displaying long-range firepower after weeks of relative quiet in central Israel, though there were no reports of casualties.

The group, considered a terrorist organization in several Western countries, claimed responsibility for the attacks.

Israel's military said 15 rockets had been fired, of which six were intercepted. The military usually tries to shoot down only those rockets that are set to hit populated areas.

Rocket sirens sounded in major cities across central Israel during the afternoon rush hour, sending residents running for shelter.

Police said they were cleaning up debris that landed in at least one Tel Aviv suburb, probably from one of the mid-air interceptions.