ABSTRACT
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) received a mandate in 1949 to provide “relief and works” for nearly one million refugees from, and displaced persons within, what had been the British Mandate of Palestine who had been uprooted and displaced in the course of the Israeli-Palestinian Arab conflict that had then just ended.1 The nature of UNRWA’s mandate, and particularly how it has evolved over time to include “protection,” will be the main theme of this chapter.
