#UN / Intelligence report says Washington can’t verify Israeli assertions about widespread links to militant groups
Who could see this coming? At the rate IDF claims are being refuted, couple of days or a little bit longer after the initial claims are published, everything Israel is claiming needs to be double checked.
[…] The new intelligence assessment, as described by the officials, doesn’t dispute Israel’s allegations of links between some staff at Unrwa and militant groups, but it provides a more measured appraisal of Israel’s assertions than public statements by U.S. and Israeli officials.
[…] In the new report, which was completed last week, the U.S.’s National Intelligence Council, a group of veteran intelligence analysts, said it assessed with “low confidence” that a handful of Unrwa staffers participated in the Oct. 7 attack, those familiar with the findings said.
[…] The report also notes what it says is Israel’s longstanding dislike of the U.N. agency, two of those familiar with the document said.
[…] “There is a specific section that mentions how Israeli bias serves to mischaracterize much of their assessments on Unrwa and says this has resulted in distortions,” one person familiar with the report said.
The U.S. assessment also says that the reality of Hamas’ control in Gaza means that the U.N. agency has to interact with the group to deliver humanitarian relief, but that that doesn’t mean that the agency is collaborating with the militant group, the person said.