If the United Nations on East 42nd Street and First Avenue should have a fire, or experience any sort of emergency, without a doubt the first emergency unit in response would be the firefighters of Engine 21, responding from their firehouse on East 40th Street and Second Avenue, two blocks away.

Outside that firehouse hangs a large banner. It depicts the photo of a handsome fire officer against the backdrop of the Stars and Stripes: “In Loving Memory of Capt William F Burke Jr” it states. “Who Made The Supreme Sacrifice On September 11, 2001. We Will Never Forget.”

Captain Burke, “Billy,” 46, was my brother. On 9/11, while on the 27th floor of One World Trade Center, the north tower, and aware of the collapse of the south tower, he ordered the successful evacuation of his men and the civilians they pulled out of  the tower. 

Billy perished in the collapse of the tower, assisting Ed Beyea, a quadriplegic, and his co-worker and friend Abe Zelmanowitz. 

Now we learn that a United Nations agency supported by American tax dollars supports terrorism. At least 12 members of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency in Gaza took part in the Hamas October 7 terrorist attack.

In response, the United States and several other countries suspended their hundreds of millions of dollars of future financial support. Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez and many others defend the UN relief agency. The “grave allegations of 12” of 13,000 agency employees should not “risk the starvation of millions,” they say. “The U.S. should restore aid immediately.”

Well, it might be more than “grave allegations of 12.” The Wall Street Journal reports that Israeli intelligence reveals that about 10 percent of the UN relief agency’s staff, or more than 1,000 Gaza staff, have “militant links.”

The Geneva-based non-profit UN Watch reports that an online  UN relief agency staff Telegram group of 3,000 teachers, allegedly bound by UN neutrality, “joyfully celebrated” the October 7 attacks. The comments from the “terrorgram,” reported on the UN Watch site, burst with and pride and unity with Hamas, honor the Hamas “martyrs” killed, and call for the destruction of Israel. 

“These shocking allegations come as more than 2 million people in Gaza depend on lifesaving assistance that the agency has been providing since the war began,” says the UN relief agency’s director-general, Philippe Lazzarini, doing his best Captain Renault in respect of the 12 accused members. 

“Anyone who betrays the fundamental values of the United Nations,” he continues, “also betrays those whom we serve in Gaza, across the region and elsewhere around the world.”

That is certainly true. And as per a Foreign Policy report of November 2021 — that’s more than two years prior to the October 7 attacks — that betrayal by the UN relief agency has gone on for years. As per Foreign Policy, textbooks in the agency-funded schools in Gaza “depict Jews as enemies of Islam, glorify so-called martyrs who have died while committing terror attacks, and promote jihad.”

A 5th grade Islamic education lesson “asks students to discuss the ‘repeated attempts by the Jews to kill the Prophet’ and then asks them to think of ‘other enemies of Islam.’” A 9th grade Islamic education textbook features passages on jihad and “the wisdom behind fighting the infidels.” An 8th grade lesson teaches students that “Jihad is one of the doors to Paradise.” 

So, a UN agency, headquartered on the east side of Manhattan, funded by American dollars, has been promoting jihad and fighting infidels. You know, the values and ideology of the al Qaeda terrorists that attacked on September 11.

And, perhaps funding grifters who make a living indoctrinating Palestinian children to violence, hate and suicide should draw some criticism from our compassionate, worldly, progressive left.

In October of 2021, America’s ambassador to the world body, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, told Security Council member nations, “we need to see UNRWA undertake the necessary reforms to ensure its financial sustainability. And we will work with UNRWA to strengthen the agency’s accountability, transparency, and consistency with humanitarian principles, including neutrality.”

Evidently, that did not work out so well. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Before restoring funding to the UN relief agency, we must ensure it does not betray the memory of the firefighter whose banner hangs just blocks away.