UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini holds a news conference to provide an update on the latest funding situation of the Agency and end-of-year needs.

The agency is the UN’s oldest and reaches across the Occupied Territories, from Gaza and the West Bank to Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. UNWRA provides the majority of schooling to children there.

The agency’s resources and reach have been reduced by years of cuts and political pressure: funding from the US and UK, among others, has dwindled; the agency faces an annual shortfall of $100m.

In many areas, it oversees the majority of Palestinian refugees living under the poverty line.

In his last address, Lazzarini said the agency was on the edge of ‘collapse.’

Aljazeera.