Sweden ends funding for UNRWA, pledges to seek other aid channels

Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.

The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency's employees' involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.  

Sweden's decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channelling aid via the agency more difficult, the country's aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.

"Large parts of UNRWA's operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible," Dousa said. "For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through."

The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: "We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees."  

Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden's decision to drop its support for UNRWA.

"There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach," she said.