Sen. Cotton says more than $1B in US aid for Gaza could have been misused

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., said it’s likely that more than a billion dollars in US humanitarian aid intended for citizens in Gaza has been misused since October 2023. In a letter to USAID Administrator Samantha Power , Cotton wrote that there is credible evidence that Hamas diverted some of the aid. Cotton also said there is what he describes as indisputable evidence that the aid was always at a high risk of diversion.

“When American aid flows to Israel’s enemies —who are also our enemies—USAID is guilty of moral failure, strategic catastrophe, and betrayal of the American taxpayer,” Cotton wrote. “You should immediately suspend all aid until taking credible and serious steps to stop Americans’ tax dollars from funding terrorists .”

Cotton pointed out that on Sept. 30, USAID announced $336 million in humanitarian assistance for people in Gaza and the West Bank who have been forced from their homes during the ongoing war. That same day, the United Nations admitted that a Hamas Commander who was killed in an airstrike was employed by the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), a USAID partner.

That $336 million package brought the total for USAID since the war began to more than $1 billion. Based on Cotton’s total, he believed all of it could potentially have been misused.

In January 2024, the Biden Administration paused funding to UNRWA due to allegations that 12 UNRWA employees were involved in the Oct. 7, 2023 terrorist attacks against Israel. In March 2024, Congress cut off funding to UNRWA until March 2025.

In July 2024, a USAID Inspector General identified “shortcomings and vulnerabilities in its oversight mechanisms” for Gaza aid, which included inadequate vetting of local partners, allowing partners to self-report their terrorist ties and challenges with third party monitors. The IG said they need to address the shortcomings to ensure USAID-provided assistance to Gaza is not diverted or misused.

“These flawed “oversight mechanisms” are the very procedures that led USAID to ignore or tolerate UNRWA employees who belonged to Hamas,” Cotton wrote in his letter, “As nothing has changed, how should the Congress trust that any aid sent to Gaza will not end up in the hands of Hamas?”

According to USAID, 1.9 million Palestinians have been forced from their homes during the war and more than 2.1 million face acute food insecurity.

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