Hawzah News Agency (Occupied Territories) - The US announced on Friday that it has “carefully reviewed” the aid program and “will no longer commit further funding to this irredeemably flawed operation.”

The decision made by the administration of President Donald Trump cuts some $300 million of planned support to the 70-year-old United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).

Israel, however, supported the move that has thrown the agency into financial crisis, according to an official in the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was speaking on condition of anonymity.

"Consolidating the refugee status of Palestinians is one of the problems that perpetuate the conflict,” said the official,” the official was quoted by AFP as saying.

Trump has formerly complained that Washington received "no appreciation or respect" for the aid it provided to the region.

He has also threatened this year to cut aid to the Palestinians over what he called their unwillingness to negotiate with Israel.

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes during the war that led to the creation of the Israeli regime in 1948.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas denounced the US decision as a “flagrant assault" against Palestinians on Friday, said his spokesman.

UNRWA has for decades been providing health care, education and social services to Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.

The Trump administration, which is preparing its own Israeli-Palestinian peace plan, separately said last week that it will cut $200 million slated for direct US aid to the Palestinian Authority. It said the budget would be “redirected” elsewhere. 

The loss of funds will be hard on the Palestinians, according to Ghassan Khatib, vice president for development and communications at Birzeit University, near the occupied West Bank town of Ramallah. But, he said, it will do little to change these people’s status as refugees.

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