Jeremy Scahill & Eyad Amawi on UNRWA, GHF, and the Palestinian Right of Return

Drop Site discussed the direct line between Israel’s dismantling of established humanitarian systems and its broader campaign to erase the Palestinian right to exist in and return to Palestine.

Jeremy Scahill explains how UNRWA — the UN agency for Palestinian refugees — is not just an aid provider, but a symbol and legal enshrinement of Palestinian refugee rights. That’s precisely why it is under systematic attack.

Israel, with U.S. backing, is replacing UNRWA’s infrastructure with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), an ethnic cleansing vehicle disguised as aid. Scahill calls it a “fake organization with a cynical name… run by a looney bin Christian supremacist scam artist.”

GHF is meant to delegitimize UNRWA and create an alternative narrative in which there are no more refugees — only aid recipients confined to a permanent “smart” detention system.

Eyad Amawi, a descendant of refugees from 1948, responded emotionally. He explained how UNRWA isn’t just trusted — it also holds the very records that connect displaced families to their villages and their historical land. He recalls revisiting old UNRWA documents from his grandfather’s village while writing his book, emphasizing: “It shows that one day, we must return.”

Amawi also believes that GHF isn’t about aid logistics. It’s about ending a people’s legal and moral claim to their homeland. “When they normalize GHF in the media, they think we will forget the UN,” he says. “But all our people know the truth.”