US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley on Tuesday appeared to question the world body's count of Palestinian refugees and stressed that the right of return should be “off the table.”
In remarks at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington think tank often sympathetic to Israel, Haley agreed with a questioner who suggested that the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNWRA), which helps Palestinian refugees, overcounts their number.
"We will be a donor if it (UNRWA) reforms what it does... if they actually change the number of refugees to an accurate account, we will look back at partnering them," Haley said.
Under UNRWA's definition, there are five million Palestinians eligible for its services, including those who fled what is now Israel in the war that surrounded its creation and their descendants. However, US and Israeli reports say the Trump administration may recognize only 500,000 refugees, as 750,000 people have left their villages.
The United States earlier this year cut its aid to UNRWA to $60 million from a promised $350 million for the year.
Haley implicitly rejected the right of return, a key Palestinian demand.
Asked whether the right of return should be "off the table," Haley replied: "I do agree with that, and I think we have to look at this in terms of what's happening (with refugees) in Syria, what's happening in Venezuela."
She hinted that the US administration would examine the possibility of a formal rejection of the Palestinian demand for the return of refugees who fled between 1947 and 1948 with their children to Israel after the conclusion of a final peace agreement.
"I absolutely think we have to look at the right of return," she said.
The right of return is one of the major contentious issues between Palestinians and Israelis. While the Palestinians insist that it is a sacred right, Israel rejects the return of Palestinian refugees and considers it an attempt to destroy Israel demographically.
Haley’s comments confirm various reports on Trump's intention to define a new and entirely different policy in early September regarding UNRWA and the Palestinian refugee issue.
