US gives $5 million in coronavirus aid to Palestinian Authority

Since taking office, President Donald Trump has taken a firm stance against funding the Palestinian Authority’s terrorist activities.

By World Israel News Staff

The Trump administration announced on Thursday that it will give the Palestinian Authority (PA) $5 million to help fight the coronavirus.

“I am very pleased that the United States is providing $5 million for hospitals and Palestinians to meet the immediate and vital needs of the fight against COVID-19,” tweeted U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman.

“The United States, as the largest donor of aid, pledged to help the Palestinian people, and others around the world, in this crisis,” he added.

As of Thursday, 229 residents of the PA-administered areas of Judea and Samaria have been infected with the coronavirus and two have died, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

Seventy-five percent of those infected work in Israel, 10 percent are travelers, six are medics, and one is a recently released terrorist, reports Wafa.

Since taking office, President Donald Trump has taken a firm stance against funding the PA’s terrorist activities.

In March 2018, the Senate passed the Taylor Force Act into law, which stops American financial support to the PA as long as it continues to pay salaries to convicted terrorists and deceased terrorists’ families.

The State Department announced in September 2018 that the U.S. – the largest contributor to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), giving $350 million in annual aid – will make slash all funding to the agency until it stops supporting terror.

Both the U.S. and Israel accuse UNRWA  of perpetuating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by supporting a school curriculum that promotes anti-Semitism and hatred of Israel in its classrooms and for assisting terrorists.

UNRWA has also been criticized for continuing to define successive generations of Palestinians as “refugees,” regardless of their citizenship or resettlement in other countries. UNRWA has classified more than 5 million people as “refugees,” whereas its critics claim the real number is in the tens of thousands.