Aid efforts in Gaza slow as millions of promised USAID dollars do not arrive, agency officials say [View all]

JERUSALEM (AP) — The Trump administration’s cuts to USAID have frozen hundreds of millions of dollars in contractual payments to aid groups, leaving them paying out of pocket to preserve a fragile ceasefire, according to officials from the U.S. humanitarian agency.

The cutbacks threaten to halt the small gains aid workers have made combatting Gaza’s humanitarian crisis during the Israel-Hamas ceasefire. They also could endanger the tenuous truce, which the Trump administration helped cement.

USAID was supposed to fund much of the aid to Gaza as the ceasefire progressed, and the Trump administration approved over $383 million on Jan. 31 to that end, according to three USAID officials.

But since then, there have been no confirmed payments to any partners in the Middle East, they said. The officials, who have survived multiple rounds of furloughs, spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.

https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-war-usaid-gaza-ceasefire-0a56d5d591c249eb5e44ba29c9adaa3e