The secret mission to rescue the UN’s vital Palestinian refugee archive
Millions of documents chronicling generations of trauma saved from Gaza and East Jerusalem in 10-month Unrwa operation
TL;DR
- A 10-month operation saved crucial Palestinian refugee archives from Unrwa compounds in Gaza and East Jerusalem.
- The archives contain registration cards, birth, marriage, and death certificates dating back generations, detailing Palestinian experiences and displacement.
- The rescue involved risky trips under bombardment, staff carrying documents unobserved across borders, and airlifting precious boxes.
- Israel has a history of hostility towards Unrwa, intensifying efforts to expel the agency and obstruct its work, especially after the October 2023 attacks.
- Unrwa officials believed Israeli authorities would seize or refuse passage for the archives if their significance was known.
- Documents from Gaza were transported to Rafah, then moved to Egypt, and eventually airlifted to Amman, Jordan, by a Jordanian charity.
- Archives from East Jerusalem were also secretly transferred over several months to Unrwa offices in Jordan.
- In Amman, over 50 Unrwa staff are digitizing the nearly 30 million documents, a process expected to take another two years.
- The digitized archives will allow refugees to trace family trees, show patterns of displacement, and provide a historical record of disputed events.
- The Unrwa archive holds particular significance for Palestinians as a stateless people without a unified national archive.