The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today condemned the Biden administration’s “morally depraved and glaringly inconsistent” decision to engage in collective punishment against Palestinians by cutting funding the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in response to unsubstantiated and suspiciously timed allegations made by the Israeli government.
In a statement, CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad said:
“As a Palestinian-American who grew up in a refugee camp and personally benefited from UNRWA’s support, I know that this agency is a desperately needed source of humanitarian aid for the Palestinian people, especially in Gaza.
“It is morally depraved and glaringly inconsistent for President Biden to cut UNRWA funding on the basis of unconfirmed allegations made by the Israeli government while he simultaneously funds the Israeli government despite confirmed allegations of their systematic war crimes. The timing of the announcement, the same day as the ICJ ruling, is also incredibly suspicious.
“By cutting UNRWA funding, the Biden administration is both fulfilling a wish of far-right Israeli ministers who want to starve Palestinians into exile and engaging in a form of collective punishment against 5 million innocent Palestinian civilians. When President Biden was running for office, he pledged to reverse the Trump administration’s hateful and baseless cutting of UNRWA funding. Now he has restored the Trump policy, punishing millions of innocent people at the behest of an Israeli government that wants to make it impossible for Palestinians to survive in Gaza. We call on the Biden administration to immediately restore UNRWA funding.”
BACKGROUND
On the very same day that the International Court of Justice issued a ruling allowing South Africa’s genocide charge against Israel to proceed, the Biden administration and the Israeli government publicly claimed that that 12 of UNRWA’s thousands of members were suspected of somehow being involved in the October 7 attack. Several nations, including the United States, suspended funding for the agency despite the fact that UNRWA had already opened an investigation and cut ties with the accused individuals.
UNRWA employs 30,000 Palestinians, serving the needs of 5.9 million descendants of refugees, in the Gaza Strip, West Bank and in vast camps in neighboring Arab countries. In Gaza, it employs 13,000 people, running schools, primary healthcare clinics and other social services, as well as distributing aid.
Its services in Gaza have increased in importance since 2005, when Israel and Egypt imposed a blockade causing an economic collapse with one of the highest unemployment rates in the world.
SEE: Palestinians in Gaza See UNRWA Funding Cuts as ‘Death Sentence’
What is UNRWA and why are some countries suspending its funding?
https://www.reuters.com/world/what-is-unrwa-un-palestinian-refugee-agency-2024-01-29/
Rep. Ocasio-Cortez Responds to US Cutting Aid to UNRWA
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CONTACT: CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, 404-285-9530, e-Mitchell@cair.com; CAIR Government Affairs Director Robert McCaw, 202-742-6448, rmccaw@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-744-7726, ihooper@cair.com, CAIR National Communications Manager Ismail Allison, 202-770-6280, iallison@cair.com