US approves $30 million for new Gaza aid group

The support comes as the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has been vilified by the UN, which refuses to work with it.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

The U.S. has approved the transfer of $30 million to the new aid group that has been providing food to Gazan civilians for the last month, Reuters reported Tuesday.

The report said that the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) grant “was authorized on Friday under a ‘priority directive’ from the White House and State Department,” with the first $7 million tranche already transferred to the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).

Anonymous sources cited by Reuters said that this could be the start of a monthly disbursement of $30 million to GHF, which was exempted from the audit that first-time recipients of USAID are supposed to undergo before being approved for American government assistance.

This kind of financial review “would normally take many, many weeks if not months,” said one source.

The move comes despite the controversy surrounding the group run by a private American company set up several months ago, called Safe Reach Solutions.

The UN and other international aid agencies refuse to work with GHF, alleging that its source of funding is not transparent and that it picks and chooses which Gazans receive food when the aid should be unconditional to all.

GHF is backed by the Israeli government specifically because it attempts to prevent Hamas members from stealing aid, which the terrorist organization has done with the vast majority of food and medicine that has entered the Strip via international groups such as UNRWA.

It then sells the aid at high prices, which enriches its coffers to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars and pays its members’ salaries, thereby prolonging the war it sparked on October 7, 2023 when the terrorists invaded Israel, massacred 1,200 people and took 251 hostages, 20 of whom are still alive in their hands.

GHF has also come under fire because dozens of Gazans have been killed in proximity to their aid distribution sites, even though their staffers, hired by the private American company providing security for the sites, are not being blamed directly for their deaths.

Although the IDF has confirmed firing at some who have threateningly approached Israeli troops securing the general area, GHF has pointed out that Hamas has a direct interest in terrorizing and punishing those who go for aid that it cannot control, because much of its power over the people comes from an uncontested ability to provide them with food and other necessities.

GHF has pleaded for other aid agencies to join in its vital work if they are so concerned about the plight of Gazans in the war-torn coastal enclave.

It stated Tuesday that in the one month since it began operations, GHF has managed to deliver 40 million meals’ worth of food to the population at its four distribution centers.