Banning Aid, Firing Critics: Netanyahu’s Latest Power Plays Spell Disaster for Palestinians
Two recent decisions by Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, hammered two nails in the country’s right-wing populist coffin. The implications are devastating.
(LEFT) A Palestinian boy carries food aid provided by the UNRWA (United Nations Relief Works Agency) June 6, 2010. (Mahmud Hams/AFP via Getty Images). (RIGHT) Israel's Defence Minister Yoav Gallant speaks during a ceremony marking the Hebrew calendar anniversary of the Hamas attack on October 7 at the Mount Herzl military cemetery in Jerusalem on October 27, 2024. Gil Cohen-Magen/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)
On November 8, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced the next Israeli ambassador to the U.S., Yechiel Leiter, who will take office on the same day that incoming American President Donald Trump is inaugurated. Days later, Trump announced that his administration’s ambassador to Israel will be former governor of Arkansas, Mike Huckabee. Both incoming ambassadors are almost certain to usher in a far-right, anti-Palestinian diplomatic mission. These nominations have also overshadowed from two major decisions made by Netanyahu just days before: ending cooperation with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), and firing the Israeli Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant.
These two decisions by the Netanyahu government hammered two nails in the populist coffin, and the implications are devastating. They also prove a point that was already clear: Netanyahu will continue to bend to the will of the radical right-wing faction of his party. As we’ve seen throughout Netanyahu’s reign, and particularly in his efforts to consolidate power since the outset of Israel’s war on Gaza, his political whims will continue to fall squarely on Palestinian civilians, threaten the safety of Israelis, and destabilize the international community.
Banning UNRWA
Since a UN report found that 12 UNRWA employees were involved in the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, Israeli society remains caught in a frenzy of anti-UNRWA hysteria– a hysteria that has eclipsed understanding of the crucial work that the UN agency does on a daily basis in the region.
This deeply misguided decision by the Israeli government completely ignores every necessary service UNRWA provides. The agency’s areas of responsibility fall within Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon, and beyond. UNRWA is the largest provider of education in Gaza and the second largest in the West Bank. The agency provides health, finance, and emergency services. It has provided essential humanitarian aid in Gaza at a time when humanitarian aid is needed more desperately than ever.
UNRWA’s work providing for the basic needs of Palestinians living under occupation is already filling a duty that ultimately lies with, and has been abdicated by, the State of Israel. As the occupying power, Israel is responsible for providing food, medical supplies, clothing, bedding, shelter and other necessarily survival materials for the civilian population in its occupied territories, according to the Geneva Convention.
In February, Israel’s Chief Coordinator of Government Activities in the Occupied Territories, Commander Ghassan Alian, said that despite concerns over Hamas breaches of UNRWA, there was no alternative organization for aid distribution in the Gaza Strip. Around the same time, sources told Israeli newspaper Israel Hayom that “if the connection with UNRWA is completely severed there will be no one to distribute aid to Gaza Strip residents, leading to a humanitarian crisis.” The humanitarian crisis in Gaza is already well underway, even while UNRWA is still allowed to operate. A ban on UNRWA activity will further decimate the already dire distribution of aid to vulnerable populations.
In 1967, UNRWA entered into an agreement with Israel that allowed them to provide care for Palestinian refugees in the absence of adequate aid from the Israeli government. In this way, Israel could offload some of its responsibilities to a UN-run body. Israel has been de jure responsible for the livelihood of civilians living under its occupation since 1949. Israel’s minimal collaboration with UNRWA and other humanitarian aid organizations is now nearly nonexistent. What little credibility Israel once had for caring for the livelihood of civilians is gone.
It is now abundantly clear that the Israeli government is the sole organization to blame for the lack of aid and necessary materials to Palestinian civilians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Banning UNRWA leaves no doubt that Netanyahu and his government will do anything to pander to the most bloodthirsty demands of their far-right supporters, even when it further compromises Israel’s already shaky footing within the United Nations and with its most valuable ally, the United States. Withdrawing from UNRWA serves as a decisive–perhaps lethal–blow to Israel’s relationship with the largest international governing body.
Firing Yoav Gallant
An even more damning data point proving Netanyahu’s stark prioritization of his own political power came when the Prime Minister fired his Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant, on November 5th. Gallant, though a staunch supporter of the right-wing Likkud Party in Israel, criticized the Prime Minister–particularly on his unwillingness to secure a hostage deal.
This wasn’t the first time Netanyahu moved to fire his oppositional defense minister. In March 2023, Netanyahu fired Gallant over his criticism of the prime minister’s proposed judicial reform. He was met with massive demonstrations when Israelis took to the streets to protest this judicial reform and Netanyahu re-instated Gallant. Over 18 months later, the Israeli public and their priorities have changed drastically. Still, several thousand Israelis took to the streets to protest Gallant’s firing overnight on November 5th. Particularly outraged are the families of Israeli hostages still in Gaza and their supporters, who rightfully fear Netanyahu’s latest move to shrink the possibility of a ceasefire, hostage deal, and end to the war into near nothingness.
Whatever guardrails the United States thought they could employ on Netanyahu and his government are gone with the latest personnel changes. Gallant was “a close interlocutor” for the U.S. and was reported “to have daily conversations” with U.S. Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin. Gallant’s replacement, prior Foreign Minister Israel Katz, is a longtime ally of Netanyahu and a fan of re-elected President Trump– he lauded Trump for recognizing Jerusalem as the location for the American Embassy to Israel in 2017 and even suggested naming a popular Jerusalem transit station after President Trump at the time.
Gideon Sa’ar, the replacement Foreign Minister, enjoys deep support in the ultra-Orthodox community and parties that Netanyahu has drawn increasingly close to. He holds, and has long held, an extremist view on Israel’s Gaza policy. Sa’ar ran for Prime Minister against Netanyahu in 2021. In an interview with the U.S.-based Washington Institute during his campaign, Sa’ar advocated for long-term Israeli military control over the Gaza Strip. “We had the experience of the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip,” the then-candidate argued. “We uprooted all civil and military presence in the Gaza Strip. Since then, we did not get more stability and security, we got less.” With Sa’ar as the Foreign Minister, Israeli re-occupation and indefinite military control in Gaza prove more likely than not.
Conclusion
The Guardian reported that Netanyahu was one of the first world leaders to congratulate Trump for his victory on the morning after Election Day. “The conversation was warm and cordial,” an official statement from the Prime Minister’s office read. Holding such “warm and cordial” relationships in his own cabinet and diplomatically with the United States, Israel’s biggest funder and supporter on the international stage, Netanyahu is more capable than ever of exacting his most harmful political and military goals without barrier or consequence.
We do not yet know the geopolitical ramifications of Netanyahu’s latest twin sinister actions. What we do know is that banning UNRWA and firing Yoav Gallant, paired with a Trump-emboldened Netanyahu will only exacerbate the current living hell for Gazans and all Palestinians. They, along with Israeli civilians and the international community, will continue to pay the devastating price.
Editors
Carolina Xavier, Editor In Chief
Cameron Roberts, Managing Editor
Makenzie Rodrigues, Copy Editor
Maya Nir (she/her) is a first year MA candidate in International Relations at NYU. She received her BA in Political and Social Thought at the University of Virginia, where she wrote her senior honors thesis on Transitional Justice in Tunisia after the Arab Spring. She also studied Arabic and French languages. Maya was previously the Media Relations Coordinator for Foreign Affairs Magazine and part of the Global Communications and Media Relations team at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. She is now an editorial assistant at Just Security. When not working, she enjoys playing Ultimate Frisbee and sampling bakeries around Brooklyn.
