Israel allows machine guns into Gaza to protect UN aid chief
AFP
JERUSALEM- Israel has allowed the UN agency for Palestinian refugees to take four automatic weapons into the Gaza Strip to provide protection for its local chief John Ging, officials said on Friday.
"Last week the defence establishment authorised UNRWA to take four weapons into Gaza for the protection of John Ging, in addition to the pistols his security already has," said Major Guy Inbar, an Israeli military spokesman.
Chris Gunness, a spokesman for the UN Relief and Works Agency, said they "don't comment on security matters."
However, Ging has been attacked in the past by radical Islamist groups in the volatile territory, and in 2007 one person was killed and six wounded in an attack on a UNWRA school.
UNRWA plays a key role in distributing aid in the impoverished Hamas-ruled Palestinian enclave, and says it is supplying food assistance to 900,000 people out of a 1.5-million population.
Inbar said the issue of taking weapons into Gaza had first been raised three years ago, but UNWRA only acquired the guns five months ago.
"It seems that five months to authorise the import of weapons to the Gaza Strip is reasonable," he said.
Israel tightly controls all but one of the border crossings into Gaza and maintains a sea blockade in a bid to prevent weapons reaching Hamas.
UNRWA, the largest UN agency with more than 25,000 employees, was established in the aftermath of the 1948 Arab-Israeli war to provide relief for upwards of 700,000 Palestinian refugees uprooted by the conflict.
Today the agency provides education, health, relief and social services to more than 4.3 million registered Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
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However, Ging has been attacked in the past by radical Islamist groups in the volatile territory, and in 2007 one person was killed and six wounded in an attack on a UNWRA school.
UNRWA plays a key role in distributing aid in the impoverished Hamas-ruled Palestinian enclave, and says it is supplying food assistance to 900,000 people out of a 1.5-million population.
Inbar said the issue of taking weapons into Gaza had first been raised three years ago, but UNWRA only acquired the guns five months ago.
"It seems that five months to authorise the import of weapons to the Gaza Strip is reasonable," he said.
Israel tightly controls all but one of the border crossings into Gaza and maintains a sea blockade in a bid to prevent weapons reaching Hamas.
UNRWA, the largest UN agency with more than 25,000 employees, was established in the aftermath of the 1948 Arab-Israeli war to provide relief for upwards of 700,000 Palestinian refugees uprooted by the conflict.
Today the agency provides education, health, relief and social services to more than 4.3 million registered Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
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