Fifth Israeli entry at the Qalandia training centre since May
Guterres has told Israel to leave every UN site it has taken and hand it back, after more than 50 personnel and four armoured vehicles moved onto the vocational school.
Israeli security forces have gone into the UN refugee agency's vocational training centre at Qalandia without permission five times since May, the United Nations said on Tuesday. The most recent of them brought more than 50 personnel and four armoured vehicles onto the site north of occupied Jerusalem.
Twenty members of staff were on the premises when the forces arrived at 10 am, the agency said. Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general, condemned the operation in the strongest terms and said the Israeli authorities had acted to "unlawfully enter and remain" in the centre.
He called on Israel to stop interfering with the agency's buildings, to leave every site it has taken and return it without delay, and repeated a demand that Israeli legislation restricting the agency's work in the occupied territories be repealed. His spokesman, Stephane Dujarric, said the measures were "wholly unacceptable and inconsistent" with Israel's obligations in law, and pointed to the UN Charter and to an advisory opinion issued by the International Court of Justice in 2025.
The count of five is what separates this from a single incident. Israel shut the agency's headquarters in the Sheikh Jarrah district of occupied East Jerusalem at the start of 2025 and later declared the compound seized, and the buildings there have since been pulled down. Water and electricity have been cut off at several of its other facilities.
The Qalandia centre is the oldest vocational school the agency operates, and has been putting students from across the occupied West Bank through training for skilled trades for more than 70 years. Work has already begun on bringing down part of the complex, which carries teaching, training and health services together on one plot.
The agency has asked governments to act to protect the centre and its remaining premises in occupied East Jerusalem. The main entrance to the adjoining Qalandia refugee camp is shut, one of a series of Israeli measures across the area over recent weeks.