the protection of refugee rights. It is instead shorthand for a long-standing colonial logic: preserving the geopolitical status quo, preventing refugee return, and ensuring the containment of Palestinian political identity within fragmented, aid-dependent systems. This securitized framework prioritizes the interests of the Israeli regime and Western donor states over the liberation, and justice owed to a forcibly displaced Palestinian population. As the Assessment itself states, UNRWA has “contributed to Israel’s security by preserving stability in fragile environments.”39 In other words, the Assessment portrays UNRWA’s survival not as a safeguard of refugee rights until the implementation of Resolution 194, but as a buffer to prevent the destabilization of the Israeli colonial-apartheid regime. Regional “stability” in this context is a euphemism for maintaining displacement, colonialism, and enforced dependency—allowing the Israeli regime to entrench its crimes while outsourcing the humanitarian fallout to international actors. Ultimately, the Assessment fails to center UNRWA’s mandate and its crucial role in supporting the fulfillment of Resolution 194, particularly the right to reparations and reconstruction in Gaza. The Assessment acknowledges that UNRWA’s collapse would mark a “significant abandonment of Palestine refugees by the international community at a time of great suffering.”40 However, it frames this collapse as a threat to the two-state solution, as it is “receiving renewed commitment, and when the staff of UNRWA are crucial to recovery in Gaza and to Palestinian governance in the West Bank.”41 The cessation of UNRWA is not (and should not be) tied to the two-state solution, as long as that solution is enforced without implementing Article 11 of Resolution 194, which affirms the rights of 39 United Nations. Report to the Secretary-General: UNRWA Strategic Assessment, 2025,1. 40 United Nations. Report to the Secretary-General: UNRWA Strategic Assessment, 2025, 24. 41 United Nations. Report to the Secretary-General: UNRWA Strategic Assessment, 2025, 24. 17