More than 100 immigrant, refugee, human rights and humanitarian organizations sent a letter Monday demanding Congress and President Joe Biden reinstate funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency.
The letter, first seen by HuffPost, was addressed to President Biden, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) a week after Congress passed a foreign aid package that finalized the Biden administration’s suspension of U.S. funding for the UNRWA, which was providing critical support in Gaza.
For more than 75 years, the relief agency has offered direct relief to nearly 6 million Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank and neighboring Arab states. In Gaza, nearly the entire population relies on the aid group for basic necessities, including food, water and hygiene supplies, as other aid organizations suspended services after being targeted and killed by Israeli bombs that have rained on Gaza since October.
In February, Israeli officials made an explosive allegation: that a number of UNRWA employees in Gaza took part in the Oct. 7 Hamas attack that killed roughly 1200 people and saw 250 taken hostage.
But last week, an independent United Nations report concluded that Israeli forces did not provide evidence to support that accusation. Despite this, the backlash against UNRWA was swift. More than a dozen international donors, including the U.S., suspended about $450 million of aid. U.S. financial support for the relief agency is suspended until at least March 2025.
Germany, UNRWA’s second-biggest donor after the U.S., however, recently announced that it would resume funding for the aid group.
“Cutting off funding to UNRWA completely erodes the international community’s ability to respond to one of the worst humanitarian crises of our time,” the letter said. “International NGOs and other UN organizations have repeatedly stated that they do not have the personnel, resources, or infrastructure to respond to the…
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