Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, whether his Department has made an assessment of potential alternatives for the provision of support to Palestinian refugees, in the context of the pause in funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), announced on 27 January 2024.

We remain committed to getting humanitarian aid to the people in Gaza who desperately need it, and we are getting on with aid delivery through funding multiple implementing partners including other UN agencies and international and UK NGOs. This support is helping people in Gaza get food, water, shelter and medicines.

Our commitment to trebling aid to Gaza also still stands; the UK is providing £60 million in humanitarian assistance to support partners including the British Red Cross, UNICEF, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) and Egyptian Red Crescent Society (ERCS) to respond to critical food, fuel, water, health, shelter and security needs in Gaza. We will continue to support and have supported the United Nations World Food Programme to deliver a new humanitarian land corridor from Jordan into Gaza. We have and will continue to support the Egyptian Red Crescent Society (ERCS) which has a long standing and trusted role as auxiliary to the Egyptian authorities in the humanitarian field.