Trump Regime Halts All Funding for Palestinian Refugees
by Stephen Lendman (stephenlendman.org – Home – Stephen Lendman)
Earlier this year, the Trump regime cut over $300 million in UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) aid, providing vital services for millions of Palestinian refugees.
On Wednesday, remaining US funding for UNWRA was halted entirely, the Trump regime in cahoots with Israeli harshness on defenseless Palestinians, pressuring, bullying and intimidating PA leadership to bow to their will.
They want Palestinians to accept a no-peace/peace plan, abandoning fundamental rights dear to everyone everywhere, including self-determination, the right of return, and freedom from illegal occupation harshness.
A Trump regime official said a statement on halting all US UNWRA funding will be announced in the coming weeks.
On August 24, Trump regime hardliners cut another $200 million in humanitarian aid to Palestinians – funds to be used for so-called “high priority projects elsewhere,” according to the State Department.
The Trump and Netanyahu regimes are suffocating millions of Palestinians, holding them hostage to their demands.
UNWRA spokesman Christopher Gunness said “(w)e have been given to understand that certainly for this year, we should not expect any US funding, and we have built zero US funding into our planning assumptions for next year,” adding:
Depriving millions of “hungry, angry, under-educated” Palestinians of essential humanitarian aid, fuels conflict instead of ending it.
“We have robustly gone after non-US funding among traditional donors and emerging markets. And we have been unprecedentedly successful,” Gunness explained, adding:
“In just seven months, we have raised 238 million dollars – $50 million from Saudi Arabia, $50 million from the UAE,” along with generous Russian and Turkish contributions. (W)e still have a deficit for this year of $217 million” along with considerable funding needed for next year.
Separately, Germany pledged to significantly increase its UNWRA funding for Palestinian refugees, Foreign Heiko Mass saying it won’t make up for the agency’s shortfall entirely, adding:
It’s important for EU countries “jointly (to) undertake further efforts. The loss of this organization could unleash an uncontrollable chain reaction.”
An appeal to Arab League countries was made to fund what the Trump regime halted. Last year, Washington supplied $365 million to UNWRA, about one-third of its $1.2 billion budget, a significant shortfall to make up with all US funding to the agency halted.
Part of Trump regime policy is getting denying diaspora Palestinians their legitimate right of return to their homeland – what no government can legally deny them.
On Wednesday, Ziofascist US UN envoy Nikki Haley said the Trump regime took the Palestinians’ right of return “off the table” in future peace talks – largely by pretending only around half a million Palestinian refugees exist, not five million, including their descendants, the legitimate number.
Trump and Netanyahu want UNWRA abolished, its humanitarian aid to millions of Palestinian refugees ended.
They want fundamental Palestinian rights denied – the notion of Palestine as their legitimate homeland abandoned.
It’s part of longstanding US/Israeli collective punishment on Palestinians, an unaccountable high crime against humanity, toughened since Trump took office.
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