The U.N.’s beleaguered agency for Palestinian refugees said on Wednesday that a severe financial shortfall has forced it to dismiss hundreds of Gazan employees who are currently outside the territory, underscoring what it described as an unprecedented funding crisis.
"On Tuesday, 571 local UNRWA staff, outside Gaza, were informed that they were being separated from the agency with immediate effect," a spokesperson told AFP in an email.
For more than seven decades, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees has provided aid and assistance to Palestinian refugees across Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria.
But the agency has seen the voluntary contributions it relies on dwindle as it has become the focus of increasingly harsh Israeli attacks, causing what the spokesperson called an "unprecedented financial crisis".
While the work UNRWA was mandated to do cost around $880 million in 2025, the agency received only around $570 million in contributions, the spokesperson said.
