Several institutions participated in the campaign against UNRWA. While data does not clearly indicate coordination among these institutions, the media messages conveyed were consistently aligned.

Earlier this year, Israeli authorities accused 12 employees of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) of involvement in the October 7 attacks launched by Hamas against cities in the Gaza Envelope. These accusations coincided with the International Criminal Court's decision on January 26, 2024, obliging Israel to take all necessary measures to prevent war crimes in Gaza.

While the United Nations Office of Internal Oversight Services has initiated an investigation - which is still ongoing - into the matter, the accused employees were dismissed as a result. Subsequently, widespread disinformation campaigns emerged on X (previously Twitter), led by parties accustomed to leveling similar accusations against UNRWA. These  include the organization 'United Nations Watch,' previously characterized by UNRWA as “an organization with a long history of floating baseless allegations[against UNRWA] that are driven by political motives against the agency.”

The Spark of Allegations Ignites

The volume of tweets containing the word UNRWA since the start of the war on October 7 until the end of February 2024 exceeded 15 million tweets and retweets. As soon as Israel voiced its accusations towards UNRWA, the word UNRWA dominated social media platforms. The following chart illustrates the tweet rates since the beginning of October. It shows a sudden spike in tweets about the organization during the period between January 26 and February 2; the same period in which Israel leveled its accusations against the organization.

The level of engagement with the term UNRWA between October 1st 2023 and the end of February 2024.

It is noteworthy that discussions on X about the organization haven't ceased since the beginning of the conflict, whether due to Israel's targeting of the institution's facilities within Gaza or allegations directed at the institution. Among the most prominent was the claim that an UNRWA teacher was holding an Israeli hostage, prompting the institution to issue a statement on the matter. The majority of interactions involving the organization's name came in the form of retweets of related content, as depicted in the following image:

The tweet rate and its types for the word UNRWA during the same time period.

Key Institutions Targeting UNRWA

Several institutions participated in the campaign against UNRWA. While there doesn't appear to be clear evidence of coordination among these institutions, the media messages they disseminated were aligned along the same lines. The accounts involved varied from official Israeli institutions on Twitter, such as the Israeli Ministry of Defense, to independent entities. For instance, the Israeli Ministry of Defense's Twitter account posted a tweet on December 27th in the form of an audio recording, claiming that Hamas controls UNRWA.

A tweet from the official account of the Israeli Ministry of Defense claiming that the recording belongs to one of the UNRWA employees.

The official Twitter account of the Israeli Embassy in Germany tweeted several times, echoing the same accusations. The account also retweeted a post from a notorious rumor-spreading account, Visegrad24, which published a cartoon aimed at portraying UN workers as Hamas affiliates. Official accounts included the Israeli Embassy in Japan, in addition to Israeli official accounts on X.

Accusations by official accounts coincided with a wave of allegations spread by independent institutional accounts, most notably UN Watch, a non-governmental organization monitoring the performance of the United Nations, headed by Hillel Neuer. This organization previously accused 22 UNRWA employees in 2021 of promoting "hate speech" on social media, before UNRWA announced that only ten of the mentioned employees actually worked for the institution.

UN Watch had previously published an unofficial Telegram group, claiming it has three thousand UNRWA workers who were allegedly engaged in conversations supportive of the October 7 attacks. Additionally,  the NGO Monitor, based in Jerusalem, also participated in the attack on UNRWA.

Top Tweeting Countries

The United States topped the list of tweets with the word UNRWA with around 1.33 million tweets, followed by the United Kingdom and then Japan. None of the Arab countries led the list of tweets. Additionally, the interaction with the term in Arabic letters was less than its counterpart in Latin letters.

Order of countries in terms of the highest engagement with content about UNRWA

Interaction with the word "UNRWA" in Arabic letters

Top Participating Media Outlets 

"Sky News" channel topped the list of platforms with the most coverage of content mentioning UNRWA. Its tweets exceeded 3230 articles from the beginning of the war until the end of February. Following closely was the Indian website Bnn.network. The Guardian came in fifth position with around 2340 articles.

Top news websites featuring the word UNRWA in their content. Some of these websites aggregate news from their sources and do not produce it.

In terms of engagement, the US news agency "Associated Press" topped the list with over 114 million interactions worldwide.

Top interactions on UNRWA tweets