5. februar annonserte FNs generalsekretær Antonio Guterres etableringen av en «uavhengig granskningsgruppe». Målet for gruppen er å finne ut om FNs hjelpeorganisasjon for etterkommere av palestinske flyktninger (UNRWA) «gjør alt i sin makt for å sikre nøytralitet og for å svare på anklager om alvorlige overtramp når de blir gjort».
Dette tiltaket kom kort tid etter at 18 land hadde stanset sine overføringer til UNRWA, fordi det ble avdekket at UNRWA-ansatte deltok i 7. oktober-massakren og at en større andel av de ansatte har koblinger til Hamas og Islamsk Jihad. Norge insisterte likevel på å fortsette støtten med en rekordstor utbetaling 7. februar.
FNs granskningsgruppe blir ledet av Catherine Colonna, nylig avgått fransk utenriksminister. Med seg i gruppen har hun tre skandinaviske forskningsinstitusjoner: Chr. Michelsen Institute (CMI), Raoul Wallenberg Institute fra Sverige og Danish Institute for Human Rights. Det er ventet at de vil publisere sin rapport 20. april.
En ny rapport fra UN Watch avslører at granskningsgruppen på ingen måte er objektive og uavhengige. Colonna og de tre instituttene og deres ansatte har gjentatt ganger publisert innhold og likt innhold i sosiale medier som viser at de er forutinntatt positive til UNRWA og fiendtlig innstilt til staten Israel.
I et ærlig øyeblikk har UNRWA-talsmannen Chris Gunness innrømmet hva som er formålet med granskningen.
– Jeg håper at den eksterne rapporten (…) vil gi giverlandene bedre dekning, hvis det er det de trenger for sine innenrikspolitiske forhold, til å gjenoppta bistanden til UNRWA, sa han i mars.
Målet med granskningen er ikke å avdekke de faktiske forhold, og få UNRWA til å rydde opp i hvordan de har formidlet jødehat og jihad i sine skoler. Målet er ikke å ta en grundig gjennomgang slik at alle terrorsympatisører blir fjernet fra lønningslistene. Målet er at rapporten skal «gjenoppbygge tilliten» til hvordan UNRWA opererer, har Colonna selv sagt.
Som fransk utenriksminister fra mai 2022 til januar 2024 har Colonna gjort Frankrike til den fjerde største giveren til UNRWA. Senest 13. januar 2024 skrev hun at UNRWAs arbeid er «mer nyttig enn noen gang».
Også de norske, danske og svenske instituttene har vist seg å være en heiagjeng for UNRWA, ikke uavhengige granskere. Her er hva UN Watch skriver om CMI:
Chr. Michelsen Institute: Israel Guilty of ‘Apartheid,’ ‘Genocide’
The impartiality of Norway’s Chr. Michelsen Institute (CMI) concerning UNRWA is undermined by the extreme bias of its publications on UNRWA, and by the litany of pronouncements by numerous of its staff and board members accusing Israel of “apartheid” and “genocide.”
In 2022, CMI published a report on UNRWA examining reasons for the agency’s funding troubles and advising steps forward. In the report, CMI states that UNRWA’s funding problems are caused by “unfounded claims” that the agency “instigates violence, for example, through school curricula with an anti-Israeli edge.”
In other words, CMI has already expressed the opinion that claims of UNRWA incitement—documented over 10 years in a series of reports by UN Watch that show screenshots of UNRWA teachers calling to slaughter Jews—are “unfounded.”
The researcher and lead author of CMI’s 2022 UNRWA report is Kjersti G. Berg, who is involved in most if not all of CMI’s published material relating to UNRWA. Since January 2024, Berg has defended UNRWA and the continued funding of the organization (see here and here).
Ms. Berg published a book in 2023, “Palestina. Fakta på bakken,” where she argues in favor of the Palestinian “right of return,” which effectively means the destruction of the State of Israel. In 2017, Berg hosted a lecture with Raja Shehadeh, founder of the group Al-Haq, which in 2021 was designated by Israel as a terrorist organization.
CMI Senior Staff & Board Members Accuse Israel of “Genocide” & “Apartheid”
- In January 2024, in a post entitled “Speaking out against genocide and repression”, the CMI’s Anthropologist blog issued a call for papers that spoke of “Israel’s ongoing destruction of Gaza and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.” CMI made no mention at all of Hamas, its atrocities, or the Israeli hostages in Gaza.
- The editor of this CMI blog, Antonio De Lauri, is a research professor at CMI. On March 7, 2024, he tweeted: “President Biden, why do you support genocide in Gaza?” This CMI employee has also endorsed similar claims by condemned antisemite Francesca Albanese. A review of his Twitter feed shows that, by contrast, he has never even mentioned Hamas.
- CMI Research Director Torunn Wimpelmann, posted in support of South Africa’s legal action in the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of “genocide.”
- In October 2023, 17 CMI researchers and staff signed a statement accusing Israel of practicing “apartheid.” The signatories alleged “historical inequalities, injustice and violence” brought about “by Israel’s longstanding occupation” and its “maintenance of an apartheid state.” Those accusing Israel of these crimes, as published on the CMI website, included the following employees, each of whom indicated “Chr. Michelsen Institute” after their names: Antonio De Lauri, Heidi Mogstad, Anwesha Dutta, Emily Hume Lovise Aalen, Salla Turunen, Jessica Schultz, Astri Suhrke, Carmeliza Rosario, Iva Jelusic, Saul Mullard, Cathrine Talleraas, Liv Tønnessen, Mari Norbakk, Karine A. Jansen, Aslak Orre, Kari Telle and Elin Skaar.
- The recent chairman of CMI’s board, Guri Rørtveit, clicked like to endorse a post by the anti-Israel group “Jewish Voice for Peace,” in which members of the group celebrated an illegal sit-in at the US Congress.
- On October 10, 2023, just three days after the Hamas massacre, CMI Board Member Catharina Bu published a Facebook post about “Orthodox Jews demonstrating for Palestine against Israel,” presumably the fringe Neturei Karta sect, and she added a photo of a sign reading “Israel is responsible for 75 years of tragic bloodshed.” In the same post, she encouraged the Norwegian government to increase funding for UNRWA. Likewise, this CMI Board Member also posted on X that she was “very happy” that a Norwegian activist group and its leader, at a conference of the Norwegian agency for development cooperation, “express[ed] their concern about the economic cuts to UNRWA.” Earlier, in 2013, Ms. Bu called on Norway’s government pension fund to divest from Israeli government bonds. Notably, Ms. Bu is the Secretary General of the UN Association of Norway, which claims that “Israel is practicing apartheid against Palestinians.”
- Another CMI Board Member, Andrew Norton, posted an article accusing Israel of “apartheid.”
- CMI Research Director Sarah A. Tobin worked as an instructor for UNRWA.
In conclusion, it is clear that there is a systemic bias within CMI against Israel and in support of UNRWA, and that CMI lacks the impartiality necessary to objectively examine UNRWA support for and complicity with terrorism.