Posted on 04/25/2018 7:41:42 PM PDT by SJackson
Kraehenbuehl said the shortfall in funding for the agency could also mean there may not be enough money to re-open schools in August and September for the new academic year.
BRUSSELS - Emergency food aid for around a million Palestinians in Gaza may run out from June if the UN agency for Palestinian refugees cannot raise another $200 million following a cut-off in US funding, the agency said on Tuesday.
Pierre Kraehenbuehl, who heads the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) providing aid for Palestinians across the Middle East, said US President Donald Trump had withheld $305 million in funding, far more than the $65 million reported in January.
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"You already have a very, very fragile community [in Gaza]," Kraehenbuehl told Reuters in an interview during an international donor conference in Syria in Brussels.
"So if you suddenly have no certainty about the amount of food aid coming from the UN for a million people ... you can just imagine the kind of effects it could have," he said, although he stressed he was not justifying any link to potential outbreaks of unrest.
Gulf states, Norway and Canada have stepped in with a total of $200 million to help meet a planned $465 million budget for 2018. The United States, long the biggest donor to the agency, is providing just $60 million of a promised $365 million, Kraehenbuehl said.
That leaves a $200 million shortfall to fill for rice, flour, sugar and also to keep funding schools in Gaza and the West Bank.
The UN agency's call for help is made harder by the competing demands on donors for crises in Syria, Yemen, Myanmar, Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, among others.
Kraehenbuehl warned of greater instability in Gaza in part because the economy is already suffering its deepest collapse after a decade of Israeli-led blockades, and internal Palestinian divisions in the coastal strip.
Kraehenbuehl said the shortfall in funding for the agency could also mean there may not be enough money to re-open schools in August and September for the new academic year.
"This is our largest funding crisis ever," he said.
More than two million Palestinians are packed into Gaza and while Israel withdrew its troops and settlers in 2005, it maintains tight control of Gaza's land and sea borders. Egypt also restricts movement in and out of Gaza on its border.
RAMADAN DONATIONS?
Trump withheld the aid to UNRWA in January after questioning the value of such funding, while the US State Department said the agency needed to make unspecified reforms.
Many Western diplomats saw Trump's decision as a reaction to the condemnation across the Middle East of his Dec. 6 decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital and before any peace settlement between Israelis and Palestinians. The United Nations also voted to reject that recognition.
Kraehenbuehl, a Swiss national, said he had enacted spending cuts to contain costs within the agency and was trying to find new donors in the private sector. Those could be in Gulf countries, or donations made in solidarity with the Palestinians during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
Kraehenbuehl said that after donors such as Qatar, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates had come forward, he would now seek help from Germany, France, Sweden and Britain, traveling to Berlin later this week. Israel is not a contributor to UNRWA.
"It's a modest investment to preserving the region from future instability and uncertainty," he said.
The imbeciles should ask those anti Israeli leftards in America so they could crowdfund and adopt their favorite terrorist.
Can’t the Clintoon Foundations cover this?
Ask Huma...
..................
This has been known since the President reduced aid to UNWRA.
Or Soros
“... there may not be enough money to reopen schools ...”
Distressing,to be sure, but rest assured that the suicide bomber and terrorist budgets are still in good shape. You just have to know your priorities.
They should beg from the Clinton Global Crime Initiative Foundation .... they have a lot of money on hand since they dispense less than a few percent of what they collect.
Greatest president ever. I love this timeline.
Perhaps the Paleys can hold bake sales and charity car washes and make up the difference?
Stop funneling all money to these terrorists.
Without the US subsidies they wouldn’t have as much money to keep packs of killers roaming the border maiming and killing Israelis at every opportunity.
They would have less money to reward the families of terrorists killed in action.
And they would have less money to finance the constant bombardment of Israel with rockets.
“It’s a modest investment to preserving the region from future instability and uncertainty,” he said.”
After 70 years of “preserving,” seems to me that we should take another approach, because all we’ve been doing is “preserving” scum whose only purpose is to kill non-believers, most especially Jews!
So stop spending money on weapons, tunnel digging, and rockets.
cease all aid, period.
the hate us now. they’ll still hate us if the get our money.
The Palis would have money for schools if they didn’t spend all the money on terrorist missiles and tunnels.
All the leftards from socialist billionaires, elitist snob Hollyweird types and all liberal do-gooders need to open their wallets for the Mideast gimeedats or just STFU.
“Perhaps the Paleys can hold bake sales and charity car washes and make up the difference?”
Sounds too much like productive work. It’s against their religion.
Why are they reliant on Christian countries for money and food? What about the one billion muslims in surrounding Arab countries, why aren't they donating money and food? That is, instead of spending money on weapons and terrorist activities. Screw the Palestinians, let them scream at their neighbor Arabs for aid. We're not their parents.
Huuummm, not enough money to fund the Pali schools teaching hate and terror. Let me think about that a minute.
No need to give them a dime. Ever.
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