Hamas Leader Was Teacher at UNRWA

The Middle East Media Research Institute (memri) revealed March 18 that Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader, was originally a teacher at a United Nations Relief and Works Agency (unrwa) school. memri translated comments by former unrwa official Ahmad Oueidat:

But what happened was that the [West] saw that unrwa was raising thousands and thousands of cadres who could gradually contribute to the development of Palestinian society. They saw that the unrwa schools were giving rise to leaders. Many familiar names of politicians and leaders—first and foremost, we can mention Ismail Haniyeh, who was a unrwa teacher.

Who is Ismail Haniyeh? Haniyeh was the prime minister of the Palestinian Authority from 2006 to 2007. After a brief war with rival terrorist group Fatah (the PA’s most influential party), Hamas took over administration of Gaza.

Haniyeh became Gaza’s de facto head of government from 2007 to 2014. In 2017, he replaced Khaled Mashal as Hamas’s overall leader. He currently lives in Qatar.

What is unrwa? unrwa is the UN agency responsible for Palestinian affairs. In Gaza, more than 13,000 staff members run roughly 300 schools, clinics and other facilities. Few organizations sponsor as many programs in Gaza as unrwa.

Israel has implicated unrwa employees for being involved in the October 7 massacre. This shouldn’t be a surprise—unrwa schools actively teach students jihad. Indoctrination of youths to follow the examples of terrorists is well documented.

Now we know unrwa schools are producing more than just the average terrorist. They even helped create Hamas’s current leader. This knowledge implicates the UN even more for what happened on October 7.

Learn more: Read “Hamas: Made in the United Nations?”