Israel files complaint against UNRWA Lebanon director
Ambassador Ron Prosor urges probe into incident in which agency head accepted map of region replacing Israel with ‘Palestine’
Israeli ambassador to the UN, Ron Prosor, filed a complaint Tuesday with UN Sec.-Gen. Ban Ki-Moon against Ann Dismorr, the director of the UN’s Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon.
At the launch of German-funded projects in Lebanon earlier this month, the director posed with a map in which Israel did not exist and the entire area from Jordan to the sea was titled “Arab Palestine.”
“You don’t need to have a PhD in geography to understand that a map of the Middle East that omits any mention of the state of Israel, is a scandal,” Prosor wrote in the letter.
“It cannot be that an international organization like UNRWA, which is supposed to remain neutral, is party to a provocation that tries to erase Israel from the map.”
Prosor demanded that the UN chief investigate and condemn the actions of the UNRWA director, adding that this is “further proof that certain UN representatives take an active side in the conflict and encourage provocations that deepen ignorance and hate.”
The map, titled “Arab Palestine” and headlined by the Palestinian flag, named sites in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip along with cities on the Israeli side of the 1949 armistice lines such as Beersheba, Acre and Tiberias.
The UNRWA project in Lebanon, worth some $4.5 million and aimed at improving the water supply network and rehabilitating shelters in the Rashidieh Camp, was sponsored by Germany. The UNRWA website stated “a number of high ranking Lebanese and Palestinian officials” were present during the ceremony.
Created in 1949 to aid Palestinian refugees, UNRWA has been slammed by Israel and the US for backing terror organizations and causing more harm than good.
In one case, former UNRWA head Peter Henson was heavily criticized for saying “there are Hamas members on the UNRWA payroll and I don’t see that as a crime.” During 2010 the Canadian government cut off funding to the organization, saying the money would be transferred to projects in a more accountable way.
