Hello and welcome to News Hour live from the BBC World Service in London.

I'm Rebecca Keesby.

Israel's Parliament, the Knesset, has passed a bill to effectively ban UNRWA, the UN's agency responsible

for providing health care, education and humanitarian to,

humanitarian aid to Palestinians.

Israel has accused the organisation which employs a large number of Palestinians in Gaza of allowing

Hamas militants to infiltrate its staff, an allegation UNRWA strongly denies.

After more than a year of war almost 2 million Gazans have been displaced and

there are widespread warnings from humanitarian organizations that

Gaza is facing a critical shortage of food, medicine and fuel making aid more

vital than ever.

Well Israel has faced a slew of opposition. making aid more vital than ever.

Well, Israel has faced a slew of opposition

from its international allies over

this is ahead of the bill passing this evening.

The US has said the legislation is deeply concerning and earlier today speaking in the UK Parliament the British Foreign Minister David Lamy had this to say.

In every war zone, every refugee camp the United Nation is a beacon of hope.

And so it's a matter of profound regret that the Israeli parliament is considering shutting down UNRWA's operations.

The allegations against UNRWA's staff early this week were fully investigated and offer no jurisdiction for cutting off ties with UNRWA.

This weekend we therefore join partners in expressing concerns at the Canesix legislation and urged Israel to ensure

unerra's life-saving work continues.

The British Foreign Minister David Lamy there, well let's hear more now from our Middle East regional editor who's in

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