The UNRWA–Israel dispute over Shuafat’s schools, clinic and community office

The dispute in Shuafat is simultaneously a property argument, a legal dispute over UNRWA’s status, and a fight over who will provide education, health care and community services to Palestinian refugees in East Jerusalem.

UNRWA says Israeli municipal officials and security personnel entered its Shuafat facilities without authorization and are taking over buildings that remain UN installations. The Jerusalem Municipality rejects that description, saying the properties are privately owned and that UNRWA occupied them without the required authorization or rental arrangements. The available reporting does not include publicly verified title documents, lease terms or a final judicial ruling resolving those competing claims.

What the two sides claim

UNRWA: an unauthorized entry into agency premises

UNRWA says the disputed sites include a school compound, a health centre and a community-services office. The agency characterizes the buildings as UNRWA facilities and says municipal personnel entered them, accompanied by Israeli security forces, without UN permission. In that account, the issue is not an ordinary landlord–tenant dispute but the interference with premises that UNRWA considers protected under the privileges and immunities of the United Nations.

The agency’s concern is also operational. Shuafat has been one of UNRWA’s main service locations in East Jerusalem, with schools and a health centre serving the camp’s residents. UNRWA’s camp profile lists three schools and one health centre among its principal installations.

Jerusalem Municipality: privately owned buildings used without valid authorization

The Jerusalem Municipality denies that the buildings are owned by UNRWA. Its position, as reported, is that the properties are privately owned and that the agency used them without proper authorization and related arrangements, including rent. On that account, municipal action concerns the occupation of private property rather than the confiscation of UN premises.

The central evidentiary gap is important: the public reporting reviewed does not establish the precise ownership records, lease obligations, alleged rent balance or legal authority relied on for the entry. Those details should therefore be treated as contested claims, not settled facts.

A dispute over replacement services

The disagreement also concerns what happens to the services previously delivered by UNRWA. UNRWA presents the closures and entries as a threat to established refugee education, primary health care and community support. Israeli policy has instead envisaged replacing UNRWA’s role with services provided through Israeli public bodies and other institutions.

That proposed substitution does not automatically resolve the practical problem. A replacement service must be available, accessible and continuous for the people who relied on the original schools, clinic and community office.

How Shuafat fits Israel’s wider UNRWA policy

Israel’s parliament passed legislation in October 2024 to end UNRWA activity in territory Israel regards as under its sovereignty, including East Jerusalem, and to cut official contact with the agency. A December 29, 2025 amendment clarified and expanded the restrictions, including provisions affecting UNRWA’s activities and relations with Israeli authorities.

The measures have moved beyond a prohibition on formal operations. A legal analysis of the amended framework described mechanisms affecting UNRWA’s privileges and immunities and the provision of essential utilities such as water and electricity. Water and electricity were subsequently cut to UNRWA-linked facilities in Shuafat on January 27 and 28, 2026, according to reporting on the agency’s account; the affected buildings included schools, a health centre and other service points.

The most visible escalation came at UNRWA’s former headquarters in Sheikh Jarrah. Israeli authorities seized control of the compound, and structures there were demolished on January 20, 2026. UN officials and a group of foreign governments condemned the action, while Israel maintained that its restrictions on UNRWA justified the intervention.

In May 2026, Israel’s cabinet approved plans for a defence complex on the former headquarters site. The announced project was to include a military museum, a recruitment centre and a defence-ministry office. Taken together, the Shuafat actions, utility restrictions, closure orders and Sheikh Jarrah redevelopment show how the policy has affected both UNRWA’s ability to operate and the physical sites from which it worked.

The humanitarian consequences

The effects extend beyond the ownership question. UNRWA school closures in East Jerusalem have disrupted education for Palestinian refugee children. In April 2025, UNRWA said Jerusalem municipal officials accompanied by Israeli security forces entered six of its East Jerusalem schools and issued closure orders effective 30 days later. Reporting on Shuafat has described the camp’s three UNRWA schools as serving roughly 1,500 students, although the number affected by any particular closure depends on the timing and scope of the order.

Health care has also been affected. The UN Secretary-General condemned the January 12, 2026 entry into and temporary closure of the UNRWA Jerusalem Health Centre, saying the facility served hundreds of Palestine refugee patients each day and was, for many, their only access to primary health care.

These disruptions are taking place amid a broader access crisis in the West Bank. The United Nations said humanitarian work was being delayed and limited by a network of more than 900 physical obstacles, including checkpoints, gates and roadblocks. OCHA data reported by Al Jazeera recorded 3,033 settler attacks between January 1, 2025 and June 30, 2026.

The result is cumulative: children face interrupted schooling, patients lose familiar local care, and humanitarian agencies must deliver assistance through an increasingly restricted movement environment. The Shuafat dispute therefore matters not only because of who controls several buildings, but because control of those buildings determines whether essential services remain available and who is responsible for replacing them.