(JNS) Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, is wrong to claim that a U.S. Government Accountability Office report exonerates UNRWA, Latesha Love-Grayer, director of international affairs and trade at the U.S. agency, told JNS.

“He’s taking our report’s intent further than we would have characterized it,” Love-Grayer said. “We aren’t vindicating anyone.”

Lazzarini stated on Monday that the Government Accountability Office’s report “confirms that UNRWA reviews education materials, trains teachers and provides supplementary teaching documents to eliminate and ban problematic content.”

“The actions were monitored and supported by the U.S. Department of State,” the U.N. agency head stated. “Nonpartisan entities do not serve political agendas. They let facts speak for themselves.”

Lazzarini said that the agency’s report “also recognizes UNRWA’s conflict resolution and tolerance education program, which ensures the teaching of human rights daily within UNRWA schools.”

He added that “disinformation about UNRWA’s education program is a cornerstone of a propaganda campaign to undermine and destroy the agency,” and that the U.S. agency’s report “confirms, again, that UNRWA is constantly taking the right steps to address the challenges it faces and deliver quality education for Palestine refugees.”

Israel has long accused UNRWA of employing staffers with direct and indirect ties to Palestinian terror groups, including employees who participated directly in the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks. The Israeli government has published evidence of those ties.

The Government Accountability Office report, released on Jan. 8, states that “the government of Israel, international donors and others have expressed concerns about UNRWA’s use of host country curricula and textbooks, including that they may contribute to the promotion of antisemitism and incitement of violence.”

“The Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel heightened these concerns,” the report states. “The government of Israel also alleged that hundreds of UNRWA employees—including educators—had connections with Hamas or other terror networks and that the education program had led to radicalization in Gaza.”

“To identify and address problematic content, UNRWA took steps to review its educational materials, trained teachers and provided supplementary teaching documents to teach around or ban certain problematic content, while State monitored and supported UNRWA’s efforts,” the report adds. “UNRWA’s approach to address problematic content and deliver education has faced challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic, conflict in Gaza, operational constraints including limited funding, and internal factors related to teacher union strikes, according to UNRWA officials, teachers and students.”

According to the independent U.S. agency report, the steps UNRWA has taken include “curriculum framework reviews, rapid reviews and self-learning material reviews.”

The report stated that the State Department submitted reports to Congress about monitoring UNRWA between 2018 and 2024, “but half were late and most omitted required information.”

The 2023 State Department annual report to the agency was the only one to come in on time, and the ones in 2021, 2022 and 2024—all under the Biden administration—failed to describe steps that UNRWA had taken to ensure that its educational materials do not “induce incitement to violence” or “substitute problematic material with curricula that emphasizes the importance of human rights, tolerance and nondiscrimination,” according to the report.

The 2024 report from the State Department “also omitted required information on the steps taken by UNRWA to respond to claims that are determined not to be credible,” the agency said. “We found that State did not consistently follow its procedures for sourcing information to ensure report accuracy.”

The report describes actions UNRWA and the State Department took to address problematic educational material, and limitations identified related to those actions, but does not judge whether UNRWA has fully mitigated its risks, JNS was told.

The report has limited practical use after Washington cut funding to UNRWA, but it could become relevant if Congress decides to refund the U.N. agency in the future.

No relevant officials remain at the State Department who could answer questions about why information was omitted consistently under the Biden administration, per the agency report.

Criticism of UNRWA’s educational materials, which derive largely from the Palestinian Authority, has come consistently for a long time and from a wide range of sources.

The State Department has undergone major cuts and a reorganization since U.S. President Donald Trump took office again last year. Those changes might have eliminated the institutional knowledge necessary to understand why the department didn’t better track incitement to violence in UNRWA’s schools, JNS has learned.

The Government Accountability Office report did not appear to find gaps or warning signs in UNRWA’s documentation of how it spent U.S. funds. But money going to the United Nations provides less visibility than U.S. funding delivered on a bilateral basis or to non-governmental organizations.

The latter is subject to an independent financial audit for funding over $1 million, allowing for potential internal control lapses and fraud to be tracked. The United Nations has its own audit function. There is no U.S. requirement or ability to provide for an independent audit.

The Trump administration has accused the United Nations, which is in a deep financial crisis, of irresponsible spending.

Marco Rubio, U.S. secretary of state, has called for UNRWA to be shuttered, accusing it of being “a subsidiary of Hamas” and insisting UNRWA “is not going to play any role” in future aid delivery in Gaza.