Israel passes legislation that restricts U.N. agency

JERUSALEM — Israeli lawmakers on Monday passed two laws that could threaten the work of the main U.N. agency providing aid to people in Gaza by barring it from operating on Israeli soil, severing ties with it and deeming it a terror organization.

Under the first law, the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, or UNRWA, would be banned from conducting “any activity” or providing any service inside Israel, while the second would sever diplomatic ties with it.

The laws, which do not take effect immediately, risks collapsing the aid distribution process at a moment when Israel is under increased U.S. pressure to ramp up aid.

The first vote passed 92-10 and followed a debate between supporters of the law and its opponents, mostly members of Arab parliamentary parties. The second law was approved 87-9.

Yuli Edelstein, a lawmaker who chaired committee discussions about the bills, said during the debate that the laws were not meant to affect what he said was Israel’s commitment to ensuring humanitarian aid reaches Gaza. But it was not clear how that would look once these bills take effect.

Together, the laws would effectively sever ties with the U.N. agency, strip it of legal immunities and restrict its ability to support Palestinians in east Jerusalem and the West Bank. The legislation does not include provisions for alternative organizations to oversee its work.

Israel has alleged that some of UNRWA’s staff members participated in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led terrorist attack that sparked the war in Gaza. It also has said hundreds of its staff have terrorist ties and that it has found Hamas military assets near or under UNRWA facilities. The agency denies it knowingly aids armed groups and says it acts quickly to purge any suspected terrorists from its ranks.

International aid groups and a handful of Israel’s Western allies, including the U.S., have voiced strong opposition.

U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller, speaking to reporters in Washington, said the administration was “deeply concerned” by the legislation. “There’s nobody that can replace them right now in the middle of the crisis,” he said.

The bills would go into effect 60 to 90 days after Israel’s Foreign Ministry notifies the U.N., according to the spokesperson of lawmaker Dan Illouz, one of the co-sponsors of one of the bills.

The Israel-Hamas war began after terrorists from Hamas and other groups stormed into Israel, killing some 1,200 people — mostly civilians — and abducting 250 others.

The Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza reported Monday that the death toll from the yearlong fighting surpassed 43,000. The Hamas-run Health Ministry’s count does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.

The rising death toll comes as Israel refocuses its offensive on Gaza’s north, including on a hospital where the military says terrorists were operating from.

Israeli forces raided the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza on Friday. An Israeli military official, speaking Monday on condition of anonymity in keeping with regulations, said there was heavy fighting around the hospital, though not inside it, and that weapons were found inside the facility. The military said Monday the raid had ended.

Israel has raided several hospitals in Gaza over the course of the yearlong war, saying Hamas and other terrorists use them for military purposes. Palestinian medical officials deny those allegations.

The Israeli military said it detained 100 suspected Hamas terrorists in the latest raid. The Israeli official said medical staff were detained and searched because some of the terrorists had disguised themselves as medics.

The Israeli military has called on Palestinians to evacuate northern Gaza, where it has been waging a large offensive for more than three weeks. The official said the operation in the northern Gaza city of Jabaliya would last “several more weeks.”

The war has roiled the Middle East, setting off fighting between Israel and Hezbollah as well as between Israel and Iran, archenemies who had long kept their conflict a shadow war but are now engaging in open fighting.

In Lebanon, successive Israeli airstrikes have pummeled the southern port city of Tyre following an evacuation order from the Israeli military for parts of the city, the state-run National News Agency reported. No casualties were immediately reported.

Reverberations from Israel’s strike on Iran over the weekend were felt Monday in global financial markets. Oil prices fell in a sign of relief for world supplies after Israel’s retaliatory strike targeted Iranian military sites rather than its energy infrastructure, as had been feared.

Oil prices had spiked after Iran fired nearly 200 missiles into Israel on Oct 1, part of a series of rapidly escalating attacks between Israel and Iran — and terrorist groups it supports — that threatened to push the Middle East closer to a regionwide war.

Iran is the world’s 7th largest oil producer, but if the conflict in the Middle East were to spread, it could drag in some of the world’s largest energy producers.

It is unclear how Iran could respond to Israel’s weekend strike, which damaged at least two secretive Iranian military bases. A carefully worded statement from Iran’s military Saturday night appeared to offer some wiggle room for the Islamic Republic to back away from further escalation. It suggested that a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon was more important than any retaliation against Israel.

After collapsing in late summer, international mediators were trying to jump-start cease-fire efforts between Israel and Hamas. Israel said it would continue discussions on a halt in fighting after the head of the Mossad agency, David Barnea, returned from a meeting in Qatar with the head of the CIA, David Burns, and the Qatari prime minister.

Mediators are trying varying proposals to try to bring Israel and Hamas toward a deal. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi has suggested a two-day cease-fire in exchange for the release of four hostages.

Israel appeared responsive to the idea. One Israeli official said Israel was discussing the proposal both internally and with Egyptian officials. A second official said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed enthusiasm for the proposal in a meeting with his Likud party on Monday.

Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss internal deliberations about the proposal with the media.

Hamas has yet to formally respond to the plan and Hamas officials were not reachable for comment on Monday.

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Magdy reported from Cairo. Associated Press writers Michelle Chapman in New York and Julia Frankel and Tia Goldenberg in Jerusalem contributed.