AOC and progressives slam spending bill that halts funding for UNRWA as ‘unconscionable’

Progressives slammed the bipartisan spending bill that would keep the government open for the rest of the year for its proposal to halt direct US funding for the primary humanitarian agency operating in Gaza until 2025.

The leaders of the Appropriations Committees on the House and Senate released the text for six spending bills to keep the government open for the rest of the fiscal year which ends on 30 September. But progressives immediately criticised the bills for cutting off aid to Palestinians amid a humanitarian crisis.

Progressive Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told The Independent that further halting direct funding to the organization would be “unconscionable.”

“It’s also not sound, not grounded in sound facts,” she said. “We have intelligence assessments that speak to this.”

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has been the main provider of food, water and shelter in Gaza since the war began on 7 October, when Hamas militants launched an attack on Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking another 250 people hostage. Since then, attacks by the Israel Defense Forces on Gaza have killed more than 30,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

Now, a new spending bill that could pass Congress in the coming days would stop US funds from going towards a “contribution, grant, or other payment” to UNRWA until March 2025.

UNRWA fell under heavy scrutiny after Israeli officials alleged that some staffers in Gaza participated in the 7 October attack by Hamas militants. Earlier this month, Israel claimed some 450 UNRWA employees were members of Gaza militant groups but provided no evidence, the Associated Press reports.

Displaced Palestinians