The U.N. is trash. This is obvious to anyone who pays even mild attention to the issue. While the U.N. has seemed to be a useful organization in the past (maybe), we can’t recall any time in our adult life where the U.N. has shown itself to be useful or, indeed, anything but a craven club for dictators.
With that context in mind, the UNRWA is big mad that someone has called them out for it. UNRWA is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees in the Near East, and they got very foot stompy on Twitter/X earlier:
🛑 Spreading unsubstantiated claims about @UNRWA must stop immediately.
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) December 1, 2023
Making serious allegations in the public domain, unsupported by any evidence or verifiable facts in support thereof may amount to misinformation.
FULL Statement ⬇️https://t.co/gzNCMnVeif pic.twitter.com/1XGV99RbXw
So, what are they mad about? Well, they are telling us, but not quite saying it. If you follow the link they provide in the post (as opposed to all those Community Notes links), you will read this:
‘UNRWA has been following the traction of a post by an Israeli journalist on the social media platform X. The post claims that there is an alleged connection between an Israeli hostage held in Gaza and an UNRWA school teacher. The journalist did not provide more information on this claim.
‘UNRWA and other entities in the United Nations have asked the journalist to provide more information on what we consider to be a very serious allegation. Despite repeated demands, the journalist has not responded.
‘UNRWA requests that the journalist provides an immediate clarification of the claims, and that whoever may be able to assist us in determining the facts comes forward.
‘In the absence of credible information to support this claim, UNRWA requests that the journalist immediately deletes the post. Making serious allegations in the public domain, unsupported by any evidence or verifiable facts in support thereof may amount to misinformation.
‘UNRWA reiterates that it takes all allegations of breach of UN principles extremely seriously and immediately investigates them. We are hence determined to find out whether the information in question is genuine or false.
‘UNRWA is the largest humanitarian organization in the Gaza Strip and is currently hosting more than 1 million people in its shelters. Defamation attacks and the spread of misinformation about UNRWA -from any side- directly endanger the lifesaving operations of the Agency and its staff operating on the ground.
‘These harmful and presumably gratuitous acts must stop, immediately.’
So, you will notice that they are not even naming the writer, linking to the post, or even quoting it or summarizing the substance of it, leaving us to wonder what they are even talking about. The only clue we have is that they complained that ‘The post claims that there is an alleged connection between an Israeli hostage held in Gaza and an UNRWA school teacher’—which really doesn’t tell us very much. For instance, for all we know, a ‘connection’ could be nothing more than that a UNRWA school teacher once dated the hostage in high school. We aren’t saying it is that—it almost certainly isn't that—but we give that as an example of how meaningless the term ‘connection’ really is.
But poking around, there are some who claim it is in response to this Tweet:
"Uninvolved," they say, right? Well, read this story carefully. One of the abductees, held for nearly 50 days in an attic, reveals he was held by a UNRA teacher – a father of ten children. This teacher locked the victim away, barely provided food, and neglected medical needs. But…
— almog boker (@bokeralmog) November 29, 2023
The cut off text reads:
But wait, there's more! Another abductee was held captive by a Gazan doctor who, simultaneously, cared for children. These are not isolated incidents; these civilians are terrorists. Present at the Saturday massacre, they're now revealed as integral to holding hundreds captive, including women and children.
If that is what the U.N. is mad about, that would seem to be the original source of a story we covered a bit back. And further cementing the suspicion that this is what triggered the U.N., Mr. Boker responded to the U.N.'s post:
Survivors of Hamas captivity are beginning to share their stories. One of them testified he was held hostage and starved by an @UNRWA teacher. That’s not an “allegation”. That’s a survivor testimony, and more testimonies are coming.
— almog boker (@bokeralmog) December 2, 2023
While Hamas holds 136 Israeli hostages in… https://t.co/A3cBUUmE4l
The cut off text reads:
While Hamas holds 136 Israeli hostages in Gaza, I can’t share information that could endanger them or identify the survivor. I hope UNRWA treats this more seriously than Hamas’s theft from its stocks and abuse of its civilian facilities for terror activity.
That seems like him directly responding to the U.N., indicating that he believed they were pointing the finger at him, but we can’t be sure at this time. It also highlights a logical flaw in the UN’s argument: Just because the reporter is not sharing his sources, doesn’t mean he has no sources. Indeed, journalists have long argued that not only are anonymous sources necessary for good investigative journalism, but such anonymity should receive formal legal protection. We are not sure about the legal protection angle—mostly because in this day and age, everyone can be a reporter—but there are definitely some times when you are only able to get a person to speak freely with a promise of anonymity.
In addition to the UN getting dragged in its own post by community notes, but by TWMSFKA Twitter (The Social Media Site Formerly Known as Twitter) at large. And some some of the post dragging them are pretty profound:
You don’t get it.
— George Deek (@GeorgeDeek) December 2, 2023
It’s not about an UNRWA teacher who held an Israeli kid hostage in his house.
It’s all about how for 75 years you have destroyed the future of generations of Palestinians, including my family.
My cousins in Arab countries are still not citizens - not even the… https://t.co/nv6anubGhc
The cut off text says:
My cousins in Arab countries are still not citizens - not even the grandkids of the real refugees.
My cousins in Lebanon are not even allowed to work in certain jobs.
And my friends in Gaza and the West Bank continue to be victims of incitement in their own schools.
And it’s all your fault.
Shut UNRWA down.
We recall reading The Case for Israel by Alan Dershowitz several decades ago and he called out how unlike refugees in every other conflict, Palestinians have been kept in refugee status for decades afterward. He argued primarily that this was unfair to Isrealis, but Mr. Deek seems to be arguing it is unfair to Palestinians, too.
Or we'll hold you children hostage in an attic and starve them https://t.co/GXgpJUVUKg
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) December 1, 2023
We want to say we are glad to see Iowahawk commenting on more than just car issues, again. He should absolutely enjoy his car geekery, but we missed his commentary on other topics.
The next Republican administration is going to defund UNRWA so fast it'll break the sound barrier. https://t.co/RzSJzeQiSj
— Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) December 1, 2023
We are not sure every candidate is likely to do that, but maybe he is assuming certain candidates don’t have a real chance of getting the nomination.
Turns out UNRWA is Hamas and one of their own kidnapped and held an Israeli child for 50 days and almost starved them to death, and they’re super pissed you found out about it.
— The Dank Knight 🦇 (@capeandcowell) December 2, 2023
Check out the veiled threats. It really upsets them that you’re spreading this information. https://t.co/QLaPSXLMvw
UNRWA, please answer these questions:
— Richard Goldberg (@rich_goldberg) December 1, 2023
Can you verify to the world that none of your employees in Gaza are affiliated with Hamas?
Does UNRWA recognize Hamas as a terrorist organization?
Have you ever submitted your employee list to the US for IC counterterrorism vetting? https://t.co/2uxiRdu0tk
UNRWA getting obliterated by community notes is glorious. What a rotten institution. https://t.co/bIFKBqEFhw
— Erielle Davidson (@politicalelle) December 2, 2023
UNRWA’s very existence is political and unjustified. All of the world’s refugees get one UN agency, UNHCR, and Palestinians get their own agency UNRWA.
— Hussain Abdul-Hussain (@hahussain) December 2, 2023
Also, UN refugee mission is to resettle refugees, like UNHCR does, not maintain Palestinian refugee status and make it… https://t.co/qUClJozljI
The cut off text says:
Also, UN refugee mission is to resettle refugees, like UNHCR does, not maintain Palestinian refugee status and make it hereditary, even when these Palestinian refugees have long been settled.
That’s one hell of a Community Note. https://t.co/4LmV8MCSvh
— David Reaboi, Late Republic Nonsense (@davereaboi) December 2, 2023
"Unsupported by any evidence."
— Omri Ceren (@omriceren) December 1, 2023
There's video of UNRWA resources in Hamas bunkers. Investigations run by the UN concluded a decade ago that UNWRA schools are used by Hamas for military purposes. https://t.co/2o61FBnz9z
It’s rare that a social media post captures the desperation of a corrupt organization that knows it cannot exist much longer. Here is one such post: https://t.co/m7ijoVZgCO
— Jonathan Schanzer (@JSchanzer) December 2, 2023
Or what, you’ll launch one of the rockets hidden in your schools at us? https://t.co/H13Ez9y4Cv
— Kyle Shideler (@ShidelerK) December 2, 2023
I like how the Hamas boosters say “may amount to misinformation” like that’s some established threshold with consequences. https://t.co/KbN0gCZtRG
— Sunny (@sunnyright) December 1, 2023
Yes everyone, stop referring to UNRWA as a perennial enabler of terror that spent decades channeling Western donor money into radicalizing an entire population. You must stop saying this. https://t.co/VH9fbPQWDs
— Tristin Hopper (@TristinHopper) December 1, 2023
We think we are detecting some kind of sarcasm.
Watch Camp Jihad, a short doc about UNRWA's support for Palestinian terrorism. https://t.co/LeEx0thK7w pic.twitter.com/zVTFbxWbRk
— Jordan Schachtel @ dossier.today (@JordanSchachtel) December 1, 2023
u mad bro https://t.co/ELvYrZRX1d
— Emily Zanotti 🦝 (@emzanotti) December 1, 2023
Israel in Clear Statement: "Every resident of Gaza who held hostages — is a terrorist marked for elimination"
— Adam Albilya - אדם אלביליה (@AdamAlbilya) December 1, 2023
First publication: Following the exposure of News 13 last night regarding a teacher at UNRA and a doctor who held hostages in their home - today it was reported that the… https://t.co/Gz7kW8Ffbh pic.twitter.com/fiKqkHyNSQ
The cut off text reads:
First publication: Following the exposure of News 13 last night regarding a teacher at UNRA and a doctor who held hostages in their home - today it was reported that the IDF is threatening those kidnapping terrorists: ‘Every person who held any of the hostages is a deadly terrorist.’
The meaning of this is that the IDF will not separate between ‘active’ Hamas terrorists and ‘ mostly peaceful civilians’ who held the hostages like Jew slaves. Whether they thought they were only ‘guarding’ them or held them in exchange for making money:
Around they f--ked — find out THEY WILL.
(Curse word censored.) Apart from the awkward wording, we do wonder if this means that UN personnel will be seen by Israel as legitimate targets.
We live in an age of shame based passive aggressive control
— Steven Barrett (@SBarrettBar) December 2, 2023
Here @UNRWA who I personally watched delete its own tweet on a Hamas raid on their hospital is now threatening people with vague nonsense
Ignore
UNRWA will one day be accountable for any/all crimes it is complicit in https://t.co/zWuVXsxYZH
"We live in an age of shame based passive aggressive control."
That’s … actually a deceptively profound statement.
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