UNRWA, the Palestine Refugees, and World Politics: 1949–1969

It has been suggested that the United Nations may perform any of three general functions in its field operations: peacekeeping, peacemaking, and peaceservicing. The first two functions are more widely recognized than the third, and it is to the third that this article is directed with specific application to the Middle East. Peacekeeping, the termination or containment of violence, has been extensively discussed; in the Middle East such agencies as the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF), the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO), and the Mixed Armistice Commissions are regarded as peacekeeping units of the parent organization. Increasingly a separate functional category for analysis termed peacemaking has been employed referring to efforts to remove or mollify the substantive issues causing violence. In the Middle East missions such as the Conciliation Commission for Palestine (CCP), its special representatives, and the representatives of the secretary-general such as Gunnar Jarring are generally labeled peacemakers rather than peacekeepers.