RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories: US President Donald Trump’s swingeing cuts to aid for Palestinians will advance Israel’s interests but risk compromising a US-led peace push and raise tensions in the Middle East, analysts and diplomats said Saturday.
The US administration announced Friday it would no longer provide any funding to the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), a week after cutting over $200 million (170 million euros) in separate aid to Palestinians.
They were the latest in a series of controversial moves by the Trump administration that have thrilled Israel’s government but caused shock and dismay among international powers and Palestinians, making their dream of an independent state more distant than ever.
The cuts come as the international community seeks to reach an agreement to deliver significant humanitarian aid to the poverty-stricken Gaza Strip, where most residents rely on external handouts.
The US has long been the largest single donor to UNRWA, providing more than $350 million a year.
The agency provides support to Palestinians who fled their homes in the 1948 war surrounding the creation of Israel, as well as their descendants.
Israel and the US object to the fact that Palestinians can pass refugee status to their children, and want the number of refugees covered by UNRWA to be sharply reduced.
The Palestinians accuse the US of blatant bias and of seeking to strip them of their rights.
A week earlier, the US government ended Palestinian funding by USAID, which amounted to more than $200 million a year.
In December, the US recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, breaking decades of international consensus that the status of the disputed city should be negotiated between Israelis and Palestinians.
The May opening of the US embassy in the city triggered Palestinian protests that saw dozens of demonstrators in Gaza shot dead by Israeli forces.
A European diplomat said Saturday the US moves, taken in conjunction with an American pledge to veto any motions criticizing Israel at the UN Security Council, were emboldening Israel’s government, considered the most right-wing in the country’s history.
Israel is increasingly convinced it has a free hand to accelerate settlement growth and even advocate for annexing parts of the West Bank, the diplomat said.
Alan Baker, a former Israeli diplomat-turned-analyst, said the government would be thrilled by the aid cuts.
“The UNRWA thing is very logical as it has become an anachronistic organization — maintaining the refugee status rather than trying to solve it.”
Baker said the aim of the cuts was also to force the Palestinians back to the negotiating table, though others said that was unlikely.
Trump’s team, led by his son-in-law Jared Kushner and Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt, has been pushing for what the US leader has called the “ultimate deal,” but the Palestinians have boycotted his administration since its Jerusalem announcement.
The cuts mean the US is providing very little aid to Palestinians, and another European diplomat said the move weakened Trump’s hand.
“When you have no money left to threaten them with, you have reduced your leverage,” he said.
Palestinian economist Nasser Abdel Kareem told AFP the cuts would hurt Palestinians but have little impact on the government.
Unlike some European states, the US does not provide direct budgetary support to the Palestinian Authority.
The only part of US funding that goes directly to the PA — for security coordination with Israel — was not cut.
The cut “will not harm the treasury of the Palestinian Authority,” Kareem told AFP.
Nadia Hijab, president of the Palestinian think tank Al-Shabaka, said returning to negotiations would be extremely unpopular among Palestinians.
But she fears that with full US support, Israel will have free reign to increase settlement growth.
“If the PA goes back and talks to the Americans it is giving them a green light to do whatever they want to do, and if they don’t go back, they are going to do what they want to do,” she said.
“At the moment it is a lose-lose situation.”
Hugh Lovatt, of the European Council on Foreign Relations, agreed.
“If anything, the Palestinians will now double down on their current approach, which is to boycott the US administration and attack the yet-to-be unveiled US peace plan,” he said.
Hijab and many Palestinians do not believe the US is seeking to get the Palestinian leadership back to the table.
Instead, she said, they believe the US is trying to help Israel “end the conflict on its terms and legalize its occupation.”
That would mean stripping refugees across the region of their rights, specifically the idea they could one day return to historic Palestine.
In both Jordan and Lebanon, Palestinian refugees have fewer rights than citizens and rely on UNRWA services for education, health care and other basic services.
In Gaza, run by the Islamist movement Hamas, the majority of the two million residents are refugees, meaning the UNRWA cuts will hit particularly hard.
Job losses for a few hundred of the agency’s staff have already sparked major protests.
The Gaza Strip suffers from desperate poverty and is largely sealed off by both Israel and its other land neighbor, Egypt.
Hamas and Israel have fought three wars since 2008.
Some in the Israeli security services quietly express concern that immediate cuts to UNRWA could increase tensions with Israel in Gaza and the West Bank.
Trump aid cuts embolden Israel but hurt peace prospects: Analysts
Trump aid cuts embolden Israel but hurt peace prospects: Analysts

- The cuts come as the international community seeks to reach an agreement to deliver significant humanitarian aid to the poverty-stricken Gaza Strip
- The US has long been the largest single donor to UNRWA, providing more than $350 million a year
Lebanese army shuts illegal crossings along border with Syria

- The routes had become havens for human trafficking, smuggling drugs, weapons
- Army using mounds of earth, rocks to stop vehicles, source says
BEIRUT: A patrol from the Lebanese army and the Intelligence Directorate on Monday closed several smuggling routes in Masharih Al-Qaa, a region between Lebanon and Syria that lacks clearly defined borders.
A Lebanese military source said the area was used for smuggling goods, fuel and people and that the army head “erected dirt mounds and rocks to prevent the passage of vehicles and motorcycles.”
The border between Lebanon and the Syrian Arab Republic stretches about 375 km and runs through towns, villages and mountainous regions. The Lebanese government estimates there to be 136 illegal crossing points, of which more than half are in the Bekaa region.
A shortage of personnel and surveillance equipment means many of these areas are vulnerable to criminal activity, including human trafficking and the smuggling of weapons, drugs and other goods.
These open borders have served the interests of Hezbollah and Palestinian factions allied with Syria. Over the years, Hezbollah has established its own border crossings and helped protect others used by smugglers from its support base.
Palestinian factions also established their border posts, which served as channels for weapons and people. Dismantling them was the first task undertaken by the Lebanese army in implementing the policy of confining weapons to the hands of the state.
The army on Sunday denied claims made on social media that armed men had entered Lebanon from Syria via the eastern mountain range and that it had withdrawn from border areas in the Bekaa.
Military units “continue to carry out their routine missions to control the Lebanese-Syrian border, while also monitoring the internal security situation to prevent any breach,” it said.
It also appealed for “accuracy in reporting news related to the army and the security situation, to act responsibly and to refrain from spreading rumors that lead to tension among citizens.”
Since the regime change in Syria, several meetings between the two countries have been held to improve coordination on border security.
On March 28, Lebanese Defense Minister Michel Menassa and his Syrian counterpart, Murhaf Abu Qasra, signed an agreement in Jeddah regarding border demarcation and the strengthening of security coordination. This came in the wake of violent clashes between the Syrian army and groups affiliated with Hezbollah along the border earlier in the month.
The issue of undefined borders dates back to the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916, when France was granted the mandate over the two countries and drew the borders in a vague and incomplete manner. Some parts were demarcated in 1934, but large areas remained undefined. The Syrian regime later refused to officially recognize Lebanon as an independent state and considered it part of “Greater Syria.”
Kuwait expresses solidarity
On Monday, the Kuwaiti First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior Sheikh Fahad Yousef Saud Al-Sabah met Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam.
He said that Lebanon “will remain Lebanon” and that the “arms issue will be resolved soon.”
He also affirmed Kuwait’s support for Lebanon “in all areas, especially security cooperation” and called for activating the work of the Kuwaiti-Lebanese Higher Joint Committee to explore avenues for assisting Lebanon.
The president’s media office said Aoun told the Kuwaiti minister of the “importance of coordination to address common challenges, particularly in terms of security cooperation to combat drug smuggling and anything that threatens security in both countries.”
Lebanese army destroys major captagon and crystal meth lab, seals off tunnel

- Forces seize ‘huge quantity’ of narcotics from the manufacturing facility in the town of Yammoune in the Baalbek region
- 10 tonnes of equipment used by the lab destroyed or dismantled; 300m entrance tunnel and storage area filled in
The Lebanese army has dismantled what it described as one of the largest captagon pill-manufacturing labs discovered to date in Yammoune in the Baalbek region of eastern Lebanon. Army chiefs said on Monday that forces raided the facility 24 hours earlier.
“After the Intelligence Directorate obtained information about a major captagon pill lab in the town of Yammoune, a patrol from the directorate, supported by a unit from the army, carried out a raid on the lab,” it said.
“The personnel dismantled the equipment and machinery used, weighing about 10 tonnes, and destroyed part of it.”
The patrol also “seized a huge quantity of captagon pills, crystal meth, and various other narcotic substances.”
Army chiefs added: “The lab contained a tunnel used for entry and exit, and army personnel brought in a bulldozer and filled in the tunnel, which was approximately 300 meters long.” The tunnel was “also used to store part of the lab’s equipment.”
The statement did not reveal who was operating the lab or whether anyone was arrested during the raid.
“The seized materials are now in the custody of the security agencies,” it said. “An investigation has begun under the supervision of the competent judiciary, and efforts are ongoing to arrest those involved.”
One killed as Iraqi Kurds protest power cuts

Residents in the Rawandz region, northeast of Kurdistan’s capital Irbil, said protesters had taken to the streets and blocked a main highway leading to a border crossing with Iran.
Security forces intervened to open the road, leading to clashes, they said, with the demonstrations ending shortly after.
A source at the area’s Ashti hospital said “the body of a man who was killed by gunshot arrived at the hospital,” with locals saying he was involved in the protests.
The circumstances around the shooting were not immediately known, but a protester told AFP that “security forces shot” his relative, a 45-year-old father of 10.
The region’s interior ministry also said on Monday that “clashes during the protest” had resulted in one civilian death, adding it would launch a probe into the incident.
The northern region of Kurdistan has long promoted itself as a haven of relative stability in an otherwise volatile Iraq.
Last week, regional authorities announced that more than 30 percent of the Kurdistan region now had 24-hour, state-provided electricity.
However, vast areas still suffer from long power cuts, forcing many households to rely on private generators.
Despite Iraq’s abundant oil and gas reserves, years of conflict have devastated its infrastructure.
The national grid struggles to meet demand, leaving most areas reliant on imported energy — mostly from neighboring Iran — and subject to frequent power cuts, especially during the blistering summer.
Syria government forces take over Druze village in south

- Forces under the Syrian defense ministry deployed in Al-Mazraa village, where Bedouin fighters were also located
AL-MAZRA’AH: Syrian government forces were advancing toward the southern city of Sweida on Monday after taking control of a Druze village nearby, an AFP correspondent said, on the second day of sectarian clashes there.
Security forces were deployed in Sweida province following clashes between Druze fighters and Bedouin tribes that killed at least 89 people since Sunday.
The AFP correspondent saw forces under the Syrian defense ministry deployed in Al-Mazraa village, where Bedouin fighters were also located. The forces continued to advance in the direction of Sweida city.
A commander, Ezzeddine Al-Shamayer, told AFP the forces “are heading toward Sweida.”
The Israeli army said on Monday that it struck several tanks between the villages of Al-Mazraa and Sami that were heading to Sweida.
It added that it would not allow “the establishment of a military threat in southern Syria and will operate against it.”
Druze spiritual leaders called for calm and urged Damascus to intervene.
But Sheikh Hikmat Al-Hijri, one of the three Druze spiritual leaders in Sweida, expressed his “rejection of the entry” of general security forces into the province, demanding “international protection.”
The fighting underscores the challenges facing interim Syrian leader Ahmad Al-Sharaa, whose Islamist forces ousted president Bashar Assad in December.
Leaders of Holy Land churches condemn Israeli settler violence during a West Bank visit

- The patriarchs and heads of churches in Jerusalem called for the settlers to be held accountable by the Israeli authorities
- The Christian community in Israel and the Palestinian territories has dwindled as a percentage of the overall population over the decades
TAYBEH, West Bank: Top church leaders in the Holy Land asserted Monday that Israeli authorities “facilitate and enable” the presence of Israeli settlers who have intensified attacks in recent weeks on the only entirely Christian Palestinian village remaining in the occupied West Bank.
Speaking in the village, Taybeh, on a rare solidarity visit, Greek Orthodox Patriarch Theophilos III and Latin Patriarch Pierbattista Pizzaballa denounced an incident last week when settlers set fires near the community’s church. They said that Israeli authorities failed to respond to emergency calls for help from the Palestinian community.
In a separate statement, the patriarchs and heads of churches in Jerusalem demanded an investigation into the incident and called for the settlers to be held accountable by the Israeli authorities, “who facilitate and enable their presence around Taybeh.”
The church leaders also said that settlers had brought their cattle to graze on Palestinian lands in the area, set fire to several homes last month and put up a sign reading “there is no future for you here.”
Israel’s military did not immediately respond to the allegations.
Pizzaballa, the top Catholic cleric in Jerusalem, said he believed the West Bank was becoming a lawless area.
“The only law (in the West Bank) is that of power, of those who have the force, not the law. We must work for the law to return to this part of the country, so anyone can appeal to the law to enforce their rights,” Pizzaballa told reporters.
He and Theophilos prayed together in the church of St. George, whose religious site dates back centuries, adjacent to the area where settlers ignited the fires.
The statement from the heads of churches comes as Palestinians report a surge of settler violence. On Sunday, hundreds descended on the village of Al-Mazraa a-Sharqiya, south of Taybeh, for the funeral of two young men killed during a settler attack on Friday.
The Christian community in Israel and the Palestinian territories has dwindled as a percentage of the overall population over the decades, with experts citing lower birthrates and emigration by people fleeing conflict or seeking better opportunities abroad. Christians now make up a tiny percentage of the population.