U.S. criticized for its decision to end aid to Palestinian refugees
WASHINGTON — The White House’s decision to end U.S. funding to a United Nations agency that provides assistance to millions of Palestinian refugees was criticized Friday by international officials, former U.S. diplomats and Palestinians who were reeling from the elimination of a decades-long policy of support.
The State Department announced the funding cut on Friday afternoon, after it had already been confirmed by a former senior official at the U.S. Agency for International Development who had spoken to journalists.
“The United States will no longer commit further funding to this irredeemably flawed operation,” Heather Nauert, the chief State Department spokeswoman, said in a written statement.
The move was promoted by Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and top adviser on the Middle East, as part of a plan to compel Palestinian politicians to drop demands for most of the refugees to return to what they call their homeland.
At a meeting this month, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo argued against the drastic funding cut. But Kushner prevailed, said R. David Harden, who was briefed on the plans and oversaw projects in the Palestinian territories for more than a decade until leaving USAID in April.
“What we’re seeing right now is a capricious move that has a very high risk of unsettling the region,” Harden said, noting that the relief agency supported about 5 million refugees.
Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, said the cuts could destabilize refugee camps not only in the West Bank and Gaza, but also in Jordan and Lebanon.
“If you deprive people of their education, their health — their future — this is extremely serious and dangerous,” she said. “Who is going to step in? If you want to hand them over to the religious schools, to Hamas, then you have to live with the consequences.”
Israeli officials did not comment on the cuts, although they have repeatedly expressed the view that the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, known as UNRWA, is a problem.
Israel’s government has accused the agency of continually expanding the population of refugees — and perpetuating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — because it grants refugee status to the descendants of those displaced in the 1948 war that led to the creation of the state of Israel.
R. Nicholas Burns, a Harvard Kennedy School professor and a former senior U.S. diplomat who has worked on the Palestinian issue, called the change “heartless and unwise” and a reflection of “the most one-sided U.S. policy since 1948,” when Harry S. Truman recognized the newly established state of Israel.
“The Trump administration’s decision to end U.S. assistance to Palestinian refugees is wrong on every level,” Burns said on Twitter on Friday. “It will harm innocent people, particularly young Palestinians.”
The Trump administration has been working to change several decadesold pillars of U.S. policy on Israel. In December, Trump announced that he was recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
Kushner has been working on a peace proposal in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and is pushing Palestinian leaders to drop demands for the right of most of the 5 million refugees to return to Israeli-controlled land.
The vast majority of the 5 million refugees are descendants of Palestinians displaced in the mid-20th century. The U.N. aid agency officially considers all of them refugees, consistent with international law and U.N. refugee protocols, said Peter Mulrean, director of the UNRWA Representative Office at the United Nations.