United Nations officials are not offering a full explanation for the removal from office of a top official who criticized a Gaza-based group that is widely designated a terrorist organization. 

The head of the UN’s Jerusalem-based Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Sarah Muscroft, was “reassigned” over the weekend after tweeting about recent “indiscriminate” rocket launches by Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a Gaza-based Iranian proxy long labeled a terror group by the State Department and the European Union.  

Ms. Muscroft was forced to delete her tweet and apologize. She then deleted her Twitter account, and later was removed from her role as regional chief of the UN office. She “will be assigned to a new role,” an OCHA spokeswoman at Geneva, Najwa Mekki, told the Sun. 

The UN secretary general, Antonio Guterres, issued a statement last week that “specifically referred to the rockets being fired by Palestinian Islamic Jihad, so I think the Secretary‑General was very clear,” his spokesman, Stephane Dujarric, told the Sun today, when asked about the affair. Yet he was unable to say why Ms. Muscroft was removed from her role for expressing on Twitter a similar sentiment, or why she was forced to apologize for the tweet and delete her account. “I don’t have those details,” Mr. Dujarric said, “I would ask you to ask OCHA.”

In an email regarding Ms. Muscroft’s twitter travails, the Sun asked OCHA’s Ms. Mekki whether the tweet violates UN or OCHA guidelines. Rather than answering directly, Ms. Mekki offered details on the work of the UN office. 

“OCHA has been present in the occupied Palestinian territory for the past 20 years, working to help meet humanitarian needs, guided by the humanitarian principles of neutrality, impartiality and humanity,” she wrote, adding, “Over 2 million people in the occupied Palestinian territory need assistance — they remain our only focus and priority.”

Israel “is disturbed to see that Palestinian outrage over tweets would so quickly devolve into ending the ability of a senior UN staffer to keep her job, and to express herself,” Jerusalem’s ambassador at the UN, Gilad Erdan, wrote in a letter to Mr. Guterres. The affair “represents a clear surrender of the UN to threats and intimidation, and poses a very problematic norm,” Mr. Erdan added. 

He noted that in 2021 the head of the UN Relief and Work Agency at Gaza, Matthew Schmale, was also removed from office following Palestinian outrage. That came in response to a television interview in which Mr. Schmale approvingly expressed admiration to the Israeli air force’s “sophistication” as it attempted to avoid civilian casualties at Gaza.

A Gaza ceasefire last week ended a three-day Israeli operation against the PIJ. During the operation, the PIJ fired 1,100 rockets that reached as far as Jerusalem and Tel Aviv’s southern suburbs. At least 20 percent of the PIJ rockets landed inside Gaza and were responsible for more than half of all the casualties there. 

“Relieved to see a ceasefire agreed ending hostilities impacting both Palestinians and Israeli civilians,” Ms. Muscroft wrote in her now famous tweet. “Such indiscriminate rocket fire of Islamic Jihad provoking Israeli retaliation is condemned. The safety of all civilians is paramount — the ceasefire must be upheld.”

Following an outcry, Ms. Muscroft deleted the tweet and issued an apology. “One of my previous tweets was ill-informed and I have deleted it,” she wrote. “I sincerely apologize for my poor judgment. All civilians — everywhere — must be able to live in peace.” Her Twitter account later went offline, and she lost her top OCHA assignment.