Chris Gunness | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 1959 |
| Education | Ardingly College |
| Alma mater | University of Oxford |
| Organization(s) | UNRWA, 2007-2019 Myanmar Accountability Project, 2019-Present |
Christopher Robert Paul Gunness (born 1959) is the former chief spokesperson for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). He is currently the Director of the Myanmar Accountability Project.
Gunness was born in 1959 in what was then the Crown Colony of Trinidad, part of the British West Indies. He was educated in England, initially at Ardingly College, before gaining a scholarship to Oxford University in 1979. [1]
He joined the BBC as a graduate trainee in 1982. During his 23-year career in broadcasting, he covered all the following roles: producer, studio manager, reporter, correspondent and anchor. [2]
In 2005, Gunness left the BBC to join the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (UNSCO), which was created following the signing of the Oslo Accords. He was a member of a UN mission mandated by the UN to try and halt the Lebanon war in July 2006.
In 2007, he was appointed Spokesman and Director of Strategic Communications at UNRWA.
In 2014, during the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, he made several media appearances.
On 27 July 2014 Gunness was interviewed by David Gregory on Meet the Press ; [3] Gregory was criticized for asking Gunness to comment on unverified video footage that Gunness was not able to see. [4] [5] [6]
On 30 July 2014, following a live TV interview from his office in Jerusalem with al Jazeera-Arabic Gunness broke down in tears discussing the shelling of the UNRWA schools in Gaza, which resulted in the death of 15 people. [7] [8] [9] [10]
In 2014, Israel’s U.N. ambassador, Ron Prosor, called for Gunness’s suspension, accusing Gunness of “an ongoing pattern of anti-Israel bias"; Gunness responded by saying: “We guard our neutrality jealously, and we have a plethora of measures that we take to guard our neutrality." [11] This exchange took place against the backdrop of caches of rockets having been discovered at three separate UNRWA schools, and accusations by the Israeli government that UNRWA had turned over one cache of rockets to Hamas; Gunness called these allegations unsubstantiated. [11] [12]
On December 4, 2014, in response to the Jerusalem Post's publication of a piece by Palestinian activist Bassem Eid, Gunness tweeted "boycott the JPost! Don't read their lies!"; in response, the U.S. State Department issued a statement underscoring the importance that UNRWA "uphold its stated policy of neutrality." [13] Through a spokesperson, Gunness claimed that "he was not calling for a boycott against any media outlet but instead was making his objections to a single article." [13]
In 2019, Gunness left the U.N.; he founded the Myanmar Accountability Project, MAP, in 2021, and also runs the consultancy Tiresias Communications. [14] In 2021, Gunness advocated on behalf of Kyaw Zwar Minn, Myanmar's former ambassador to the UK, as means of undermining the legitimacy of the junta that seized power in a coup d'état earlier that year. [15] In September, 2021, MAP assisted in producing a legal opinion regarding which ambassador would be officially credentialed to represent Myanmar at the United Nations. [16] [17]
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East is a UN agency that supports the relief and human development of Palestinian refugees. UNRWA's mandate encompasses Palestinians who fled or were expelled during the Nakba, the 1948 Palestine War, and subsequent conflicts, as well as their descendants, including legally adopted children. As of 2019, more than 5.6 million Palestinians are registered with UNRWA as refugees.
International aid has been provided to Palestinians since at least the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The Palestinians view the aid as keeping the Israeli–Palestinian peace process going, while Israelis and other foreign policy authorities have raised concerns that it is used to fund terrorism and removes the imperative for Palestinians to negotiate a settlement of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. As a provision of the Oslo Accords, international aid was to be provided to the Palestinians to ensure economic solvency for the Palestinian National Authority (PA). In 2004, it was reported that the PA, within the West Bank and Gaza Strip, receives one of the highest levels of aid in the world. In 2006, economic sanctions and other measures were taken by several countries against the PA, including suspension of international aid following Hamas' victory at the Palestinian Legislative Council election. Aid to the PA resumed in 2008 following the Annapolis Conference, where Hamas was not invited. Aid has been provided to the Palestinian Authority, Palestinian non-governmental organizations (PNGOs) as well as Palestinian political factions by various foreign governments, international organizations, international non-governmental organizations (INGOs), and charities, besides other sources.
Gilad Menashe Erdan is an Israeli politician and diplomat serving as Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations since 2020.
Danny Danon is an Israeli politician and former diplomat. A member of the Likud party, Danon served in the Knesset from 2009 to 2015, and re-entered the Knesset in 2022. From 2015 to 2020, Danon served as Israel's 17th Permanent Representative to the United Nations. The former leader of the world Betar organization, Danon was elected Chairman of the World Likud. Considered a 'right-wing thorn in Netanyahu's side," Danon challenged Benjamin Netanyahu for the party's leadership in 2007 and 2014. Danon was appointed again as Permanent Representative to the United Nations in 2024, replacing Gilad Erdan.
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Iain John Hook was a British aid worker and military officer who worked for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) as project manager in the rebuilding of Jenin Refugee Camp in West Bank, which was home to 13,000 Palestinian refugees. After Hook left a voice message with Israeli authorities that Palestinian militants ("shabab"-youth) had "knocked a hole in the wall" and "pinned down" his men, during an engagement in Jenin he was shot and killed by an Israel Defense Forces sniper. Israeli Army radio said that the sniper who killed him mistook his cell phone for a handgun or grenade. A United Nations Security Council resolution condemning Israel was vetoed by the United States. In 2005, a British inquest jury returned a verdict of unlawful killing.
The al-Fakhura school incident was an Israeli military strike that took place during the Gaza War on 6 January 2009 near a United Nations-run school in the Jabalia Camp in the Gaza Strip. According to the UN and several non-governmental organizations (NGOs), more than 40 people were killed. Israel reported the death toll as nine Hamas militants and three noncombatants with senior IDF officers stating that the death toll published by Hamas was "grossly exaggerated". Israel stated it fired on the school in response to militant gunfire believed to be coming from al-Fakhura. A UN inquiry said that there was no firing from within the school and there were no explosives within the school, but could not establish if militants fired from the vicinity of the school.
Timeline of the Gaza War. For events pertaining to the conflict which occurred before 27 December 2009, see Gaza War (2008–2009)#Background and 2007–2008 Israel–Gaza conflict.
Incidents in the Gaza War include incidents involving attacks against civilians, a school, a mosque, and naval confrontations.
Accusations of violations regarding international humanitarian law, which governs the actions by belligerents during an armed conflict, have been directed at both Israel and Hamas for their actions during the 2008–2009 Gaza War. The accusations covered violating laws governing distinction and proportionality by Israel, the indiscriminate firing of rockets at civilian locations and extrajudicial violence within the Gaza Strip by Hamas. As of September 2009, some 360 complaints had been filed by individuals and NGOs at the prosecutor's office in the Hague calling for investigations into alleged crimes committed by Israel during the Gaza War.
The United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, also known as the Goldstone Report, was a United Nations fact-finding mission established in April 2009 pursuant to Resolution A/HRC/RES/S-9/1 of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) of 12 January 2009, following the Gaza War as an independent international fact-finding mission "to investigate all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law by the occupying Power, Israel, against the Palestinian people throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory, particularly in the occupied Gaza Strip, due to the current aggression". South African jurist Richard Goldstone was appointed to head the mission. The other co-authors of the Report were Hina Jilani, Christine Chinkin and Desmond Travers.
David Bedein is an MSW, a community organizer by profession, a writer, and an investigative journalist. In 1987, Bedein established the Israel Resource News Agency, with offices at the Beit Agron Int'l Press Center in Jerusalem. He serves as Director of The Center for Near East Policy Research.
Events in the year 2011 in the Palestinian territories.
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In early 2024, Israel made a series of allegations against United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), including that a number of its Gaza Strip staff had participated in the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, and that hundreds of them were members of militant groups. The allegations led to aid cuts to the organization, most of which were later reversed with the exception of the United States, the organization's largest donor, after inquiries found the membership claims to be unsubstantiated. The claims of participation in the attacks are being investigated, some already dismissed for lack of evidence. UNRWA, which for decades had faced Israeli allegations surrounding its neutrality, is the largest relief organization in the Gaza Strip that is undergoing a humanitarian crisis and famine during the Israel-Hamas war.
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