President Donald Trump is expected to issue an executive order today withdrawing the US from the UN Human Rights Council and removing all US funding for the Gaza agency UNRWA. Politico has the story.
The actions, which reinstate policies in place during the last Trump administration, will come on the day the President is set to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington. The US has long accused the council of bias against Israel and of giving cover to governments with human rights abuses. It comes after the Biden administration paused funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, known as UNRWA, following reports that staffers were involved in the October 7th attack by Hamas on Israel.
A White House official said Monday afternoon that the executive order signing had been moved to Tuesday.
It also comes as the Trump administration has put the future of the United States Agency for International Development — which also promotes human rights abroad — into question over concerns whether it aligns with the President’s “America First! policy and how its dollars are being spent.
UNRWA is the main agency providing aid for Gaza’s population amid the humanitarian disaster caused by Israel’s offensive in the area after the October 7th attack. But the UN fired several staffers last summer after an internal investigation found they may have been involved in the attack.
It’s also the next chapter in the country’s complicated, back-and-forth relationship with the UN Human Rights Council, which was created during the George W. Bush administration. Under Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, the US engaged with the council; under Bush and Trump, it did not.
A spokesperson for the United Nations declined to comment.
The White House, in a fact sheet obtained by Politico, said the council “has not fulfilled its purpose and continues to be used as a protective body for countries committing horrific human rights violations” and condemned its stance on Israel.
“The UNHRC has demonstrated consistent bias against Israel, focusing on it unfairly and disproportionately in council proceedings,” the document says. “In 2018, the year President Trump withdrew from the UNHRC in his first administration, the organisation passed more resolutions condemning Israel than Syria, Iran, and North Korea combined.”
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