New report shows nearly half UN relief agency’s schools affected by conflicts across Middle East

“A staggering 302 schools have been directly affected,” said UNRWA’s Commissioner-General, Pierre Krähenbühl, in an article published this week. Speaking at Summit, where protecting education is a major theme, he emphasized the courage and determination of UNRWA teachers, specialists and principals, who preserve access to learning for half a million Palestine refugee boys and girls despite these extremely adverse conditions.

“In our innovative ‘Education in Emergencies’ programmes, we deliver classes to tens of thousands of refugee children across the Middle East through ‘UNRWA TV’ broadcasts and interactive distance-learning modules. In Gaza, Lebanon, Syria and the West Bank, hundreds of specifically trained psychosocial counsellors work with deeply traumatized children to recover and move on with their lives. In many ways, we simply never give up,” he said.

The report details deeply disturbing attacks across the region, and, providing specific figures, UNRWA Spokesman Chris Gunness said that in Syria, at least 70 per cent of 118 UNRWA schools “have at some stage of the war been rendered inoperative, either because they were impacted by violence or because we have used them as centres to house the displaced.”

He said the report is equally bleak about the impact of conflict on UNRWA schools in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, where 83 UNRWA school buildings were damaged during the 2014 Gaza conflict. Further, some 90 UNRWA school buildings were used as designated emergency shelters for almost 300,000 displaced Palestinians, including at least 150,000 children.

“Six of these school buildings were struck by artillery shells or other munitions, in three cases causing deaths and injuries. Weapons components were placed by armed groups in three other schools,” he explained.

As for Lebanon, periodic outbreaks of violence have forced 36 UNRWA schools to suspend classes for up to a week at a time on different occasions. Over 50 per cent of all our schools in the country have been impacted at one time or another.

“For more than six decades, UNRWA has been an essential part of the world's humanitarian system,” said  Krähenbühl, “and all too often we have seen first-hand the terrible human cost of conflict. We therefore endorse the Secretary General’s call for a strengthening of political leadership to prevent and end war and human displacement. This includes the conflict between Israel and Palestine in accordance with international law and UN resolutions.”

The UNRWA chief concluded that at the Summit, [the agency] will join initiatives such as the “Grand Bargain” on humanitarian financing between humanitarian actors and donors in the hope that means can be mobilized to preserve and improve its investment in education for hundreds of thousands of Palestine refugee children. It is their future and their humanity that is at stake and, as the UN Secretary-General’s report reminds us, there is but “One Humanity.”

Photo: UNRWA

Source: www.justearthnews.com