GOP effort to halt UNRWA funding emerges as late shutdown threat

Funding for the United Nations (U.N.) agency that provides relief for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, has emerged as a serious obstacle as congressional negotiators race to prevent a partial government shutdown at the end of next week. 

Republicans have been pressing to block further funding to UNRWA in light of allegations that a dozen of its staffers took part in Hamas’s attack on Israel last October.

Democrats have acknowledged the gravity of that revelation, but they are quick to note the number of alleged malefactors is a miniscule fraction of the more than 30,000 employees of UNRWA. They’re warning that eliminating funding for the agency altogether would leave a void in the delivery of food, medical care and other humanitarian assistance that no aid group or world government is currently in a position to fill.

The U.S. funds UNRWA through an account covered by the annual State Department funding bill that, along with five others, is due on May 22. Congress passed its first batch of six full-year funding bills for fiscal year 2024 last week, but lawmakers are warning the second tranche will be more difficult to find agreement on.

UNRWA’s fate is one of the key sticking points. And Democrats are pressing for the aid.

“I’ve talked to all of the NGOs,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro (Conn.), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee. “Save the Children, the World Food Program, Oxfam … Mercy Corps.”

“I’ve talked to all of them, and their view is there may be something that we can do in the future,” DeLauro said Wednesday. “But right now, that UNRWA is a necessity in order to be able to get the massive quantity of aid that we need to get in there out.”

Rep. Greg Meeks (N.Y.), senior Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee, delivered a similar warning. 

“The fact of the matter is, there’s no replacement for UNRWA — there’s none — even to get humanitarian aid and food [into Gaza],” he said. “It’s not like we can say, ‘Forget them, and let’s move on to somebody else.’ Because there’s no somebody else.”

The Democrats’ push for UNRWA funding sets up a clash with Republicans, who are drawing hard red lines against it. 

Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), the top Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee, told The Hill on Thursday the issue is a non-starter. 

“We can put the funding through other agencies,” she said. “We’re not going to support UNRWA.”

“There’s not gonna be any money for UNRWA,” echoed Sen. Lindsey Graham (S.C.), the top Republican on the Senate subcommittee that oversees UNRWA funding. He also ruled out any deal that doesn’t omit the funding. 

“I don’t think you’ll get a bill if you don’t,” he said. 

UNRWA was created in 1949 to address the refugee crisis resulting from the conflict surrounding the creation of Israel a year earlier. The agency operates in a handful of regions throughout the Middle East, including the Gaza Strip, where Hamas has served as the de facto governing body for almost two decades. The group’s services have been a crucial lifeline during the war between Israel and Hamas, which has killed more than 30,000 Palestinians — roughly 1 percent of the population — while displacing almost 2 million others. 

Critics of UNRWA have frequently charged that Hamas has infiltrated the agency, turning it into a front group opposed, like Hamas, to Israel’s very existence. And those voices found new ammunition in January, when Israel accused 12 UNRWA staff members of participating in Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack, which led to the death of more than 1,100 people and the kidnapping of 250 more. 

In response, Senate negotiators of a $95 billion foreign aid package — which features military assistance for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, as well as humanitarian aid for Gaza — excluded any funding for UNRWA. That legislation has passed the Senate, but Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is vowing to alter it and send it back to the upper chamber. Those changes are expected to relate to Ukraine aid, and conservatives are insisting on the UNRWA exclusion, which is all but certain to remain.

“A lot of us would be more comfortable if we took out the money for the U.N. entities that had some of their associates attacking Israel,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) told reporters recently. 

Democrats are hoping to provide the UNRWA funding through a separate legislative vehicle: the forthcoming “minibus” spending bill slated for consideration next week. That package, which could come out as soon as this weekend, features funding for a number of crucial agencies, including the Pentagon, Homeland Security Department and State Department, where Democrats are hoping to attach the aid for Palestinians. A failure of Congress to act would result in a partial government shutdown at the end of March 22.

The Democrats have signaled an openness for new conditions on UNRWA funding, while pressing for further investigation into Israel’s claims of Hamas connections. But they also fear the disintegration of humanitarian aid to Gaza if the agency were to collapse. 

“We have a significant disagreement over whether to condition aid to UNRWA, whether to separate out UNRWA Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, [and] West Bank from Gaza, or whether to have a complete ban on aid to UNRWA,” Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), who chairs the appropriations subcommittee on foreign operations, told reporters Thursday.

“I strongly prefer that we recognize there is an ongoing investigation into UNRWA Gaza, but separate it from funding for UNRWA in Jordan,” Coons said. “For example, in Jordan, 2.5 million Palestinians in 10 refugee camps receive their health care, their education, their waste removal, I mean, it basically runs as a municipal government.”

Democrats are pointing to a tragic episode late last month, when a riot broke out around a convoy of aid trucks — operated by private contractors overseen by the Israeli military — attempting to deliver assistance to northern Gaza. In the resulting chaos, more than 100 people were killed, and more than 280 wounded, according to Gazan health officials, who said many of the casualties were shot by Israeli troops.

In the eyes of many Democrats, those deaths might have been avoided if the more experienced UNRWA staffers had directed the delivery process.

“Maybe it helps us explain that UNRWA — for all of the need to have accountability and reform for those handful of folks who participated in Oct. 7 — is an indispensable humanitarian resource,” said Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.). “They can actually navigate all of this chaos in ways others can’t. So if we care about the humanitarian needs, we really have to get UNRWA funding back on the table.”

Highlighting the delicacy of the UNRWA debate, even Israeli military officials were reportedly wary of publicly airing their accusations of Hamas affiliation against the 12 agency staffers, for fear that a breakdown of the relief group would exacerbate an already enormous humanitarian crisis — and saddle Israel with an enormous new responsibility it was ill-equipped to manage.

Heading into the spending fight, Democrats are hoping to find a way to eliminate the bad actors within UNRWA, while empowering the broader agency to continue its humanitarian mission for the sake of Palestinians. 

“It’s really wrongheaded to completely ban UNRWA funding instead of just calling for reforms and accountability to address the handful of bad apples that were a part of Oct. 7,” Huffman said. “There are 30,000 employees in Gaza for UNRWA.

“That gets lost in some of the political rhetoric.”