Van Hollen Says Netanyahu Spreading 'Flat Out Lies' About UNRWA

U.S. Senator for Maryland Chris Van Hollen continued his defense of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East and its work in Gaza in an appearance on CBS News' "Face the Nation" on Sunday.

"The claim that Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu and others are making that somehow UNRWA is a proxy for Hamas are just flat out lies, that's a flat out lie," he told journalist Margaret Brennan.

The U.S. was one of many Western countries that paused funding for UNRWA after the agency announced in January that it had fired 12 staffers over Israeli allegations that they had been involved in Hamas' October 7 attack on Israel. However, some countries including Canada, Sweden, the European Union, and Australia have since restored funding. A report has also emerged that Israel tortured UNRWA staffers into falsely confessing to involvement in the Hamas attack.

"Netanyahu has wanted to get rid of UNRWA because he had seen them as a means to continue the hopes of the Palestinian people for a homeland of their own."

Van Hollen's remarks on Sunday come days after he argued for the restoration of UNRWA funds on the floor of the U.S. Senate and criticized Republican legislators who wanted to permanently end funds for the organization that supports some 6 million Palestinian refugees in countries across the Middle East, including around 2 million in Gaza.

During his speech, he pointed out that the Netanyahu government had not shared the underlying evidence that UNRWA staffers participated in October 7 with either UNRWA itself or the U.S. government. He also urged his colleagues to read a classified Director of National Intelligence report on Netanyahu's claims of UNRWA complicity with Hamas.

On "Face the Nation," Van Hollen said that the person in charge of operations on the ground in UNRWA was a 20-year U.S. Army veteran.

"You can be sure he is not in cahoots with Hamas," the senator told Brennan.

He also repeated claims that Netanyahu has wanted to eliminate UNRWA entirely since at least 2017.

"Netanyahu has wanted to get rid of UNRWA because he had seen them as a means to continue the hopes of the Palestinian people for a homeland of their own," Van Hollen said, adding that the right-wing Israeli leader's "primary objective" was preventing the formation of a Palestinian state.

However, the dismantling of UNRWA would be especially catastrophic amid Israel's ongoing bombardment and invasion of Gaza, which has killed more than 31,000 people and put the survivors at risk of famine. No other organization has the infrastructure in place to distribute the necessary aid.

"If you cut off funding for UNRWA in Gaza entirely, it means more people will starve, more people won't get the medial assistance they need, and so it would be a huge mistake," Van Hollen said.

He also said that only 14 of the agency's 13,000-strong staff in Gaza had been accused of participating in the October 7 attack.

"We should investigate it, we should hold all those people accountable, but for goodness' sake, let's not hold 2 million innocent Palestinian civilians who are dying of starvation... accountable for the bad acts of 14 people."

Van Hollen also repeated his call for President Joe Biden to condition the sale of offensive military weapons to Israel on the country obeying international law and allowing aid into Gaza. While Israel sent the U.S. a letter saying it was in compliance with the law, "the day it was signed, clearly the Netanyahu government is not in compliance, because we see that they're continuing to restrict humanitarian assistance," he told Brennan.

Also on "Face the Nation" Sunday, United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) Chief Executive Catherine Russell described the impact that a lack of aid was having on the children of Gaza.

"We know now that children are dying of malnutrition in Gaza," she told Brennan.

Russell said that not enough aid was reaching those who needed it, calling both air drops and sea deliveries "a drop in the bucket."

She also called for greater transparency into what was actually happening in Gaza and the difficulties of delivering aid.

"The world should be able to see what's happening and make their own judgments about what's going on," Russell said.