Justice Department backs UN claim relief workers accused of aiding Hamas are immune

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The Justice Department (DOJ) has sided with the United Nations in defending in court its relief agency for Palestinians after some workers were found to have likely been involved in the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in Israel. 

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) fired at least nine of its employees in August after finding that they likely participated in the Hamas slaughter of 1,200 people, including more than 30 Americans. 

Victims of the massacre and their families sued UNRWA in a New York federal court, accusing the group and the individuals involved of aiding and abetting Hamas "in the commission of international torts."

The United Nations (U.N.) says the lawsuit should be dismissed, claiming the charter between the U.S. and the U.N. gives the group and its subsidiaries diplomatic immunity. "Since the U.N. has not waived immunity in this instance, its subsidiary, UNRWA, continues to enjoy absolute immunity from prosecution, and the lawsuit should be dismissed," the U.N. stated in response. 

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A protester holds a flag outside the United Nations Relief and Works Agency. (Ahmed Zakot/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams of the Southern District of New York filed a brief in July supporting that argument, saying, "In light of the United Nations’ immunity, the Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over the United Nations."

The brief notes that "the United States acknowledges and deplores the profound losses suffered on October 7," and that "the United States takes no position on the factual allegations in the complaint."

"The United Nations is absolutely immune from suit and legal process absent an express waiver of immunity," Williams said, citing the Charter of the United Nations, to which the United States acceded in 1945, that says the U.N. "shall enjoy in the territory of each of its Members such privileges and immunities as are necessary for the fulfilment [sic] of its purposes."

Similarly, the individual defendants in the lawsuit also enjoy immunity from suit as U.N. employees, the brief said.

Among other things, the DOJ's brief says that the victims' lawsuit alleges that UNRWA "knowingly provided monetary and material support to Hamas to build its ‘terror infrastructure’ leading up to the Oct. 7 attacks, facilitated the construction of Hamas command and control centers, permitted weapons storage in UNRWA facilities, concealed rocket and rocket-launching materials on UNRWA premises, and that that UNRWA chose Hamas-approved textbooks for its schools that were used to indoctrinate children against Israel."

The suit also alleges UNRWA "knew several local staff were affiliated with Hamas and paid staff "in a fashion calculated to further enrich Hamas," according to Williams' brief.

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Mark Goldfeder, director of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, said that DOJ's brief outlining the scope of UNRWA's immunity "makes a lot of assumptions" and exhibits a "lack of appetite on behalf of the executive branch to go after supporters of terror."

"There are also multiple technical arguments to be made here that UNRWA is not actually immune," Goldfeder said in a statement on X, directed at the Justice Department. 

"The treaties above are not self-executing; it is only an affiliated organization and was never itself designated under the International Organizations Immunities Act of 1945," he continued. "It saddens me that you chose to simply assume that UNRWA's positions are correct, instead of engaging on any of these points." 

"Perhaps the most egregious assumption you accept is the idea that the claims made by the plaintiffs against all the individual defendants here relate to actions undertaken or omissions made by them in the performance of their official function," Goldfeder said.

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Palestinians protest outside the United Nations Relief and Works Agency in Gaza City against the reduction of food aid provided for the refugees on June 20, 2023. (Photo by Majdi Fathi/TPS)

"To be clear… [the complaint is] chock-full of allegations that these defendants aided and abetted Hamas, and that they did so consciously, voluntarily, and culpably." 

"Is it, pray tell, your contention that all of those actions were what UNRWA was supposed to be doing?" Goldfeder questioned on the social media platform.

Goldfeder continued in an interview with Fox News Digital, arguing, "The basic premise of what makes it so absolutely crazy is this – the U.N. is claiming that immunity from civil suits for invading a country and massacring its citizens is necessary for the exercise of its functions. And again, the Biden-Harris administration just filed that they agree. So the point is, if you think that immunity for mass murder is necessary for the U.N. to function, maybe it's time to rethink the U.N. entirely."

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Anne Bayefsky, president of Human Rights Voices and Director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust, says that the practical effect of DOJ's position is "unaccountabillity" for UNRWA.  

"Regardless of the empty protestations to the contrary, the practical effect of the DOJ position is to contribute to unaccountability for UNRWA and its employees despite their demonstrable connections to Hamas and heinous behavior on multiple fronts," Bayefsky said. 

"Legally-speaking immunity applies here when employees act within the boundaries of their official capacities. So is the DOJ now arguing that aiding and abetting an officially-designated terrorist organization is just UNRWA doing its job?" she added.

UNRWA and the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York did not respond to Fox News Digital's requests for comment.