The Palestinian Authority's television channel recently made the startling accusation that the terrorist group Hamas is “taking” humanitarian aid and selling it “at very high prices” to exploit desperate Palestinian civilians.
This came shortly after Israeli media obtained a recording of suspected Hamas members discussing humanitarian aid they stole from Palestinian civilians. The alarming audio captures them saying they have “trucks filled with goods” and that their warehouse is “at full capacity.”
Days after that news broke, however, the U.S. State Department told the press it is still working to transport “food, water, [and] medicine” into war-torn Gaza, making no mention of the report. The latest signs that U.S.-funded aid is helping terrorists doesn’t appear to change anything for the Biden-Harris administration, which refuses to address security concerns.
President Joe Biden practically admitted this would happen when the Israel-Hamas war began. Last October, he told Israelis during a speech in Tel Aviv that he would cut off the supply of aid “if Hamas diverts or steals” it, implying that he cannot actually prevent this. Still, Biden promised the Jewish people — and American taxpayers — that these resources would stop if they enriched the group responsible for the genocidal Oct. 7 attacks.
A year later, there’s more than enough evidence this is happening. Video footage, some posted by the Israeli military, shows armed, masked men stealing aid trucks while beating Gazans who try to stop them. Gazans, risking execution, have talked to Israeli agents and reporters about Hamas stealing and selling supplies.
The Biden-Harris administration’s response has been to wag its finger in disapproval and make empty threats. In May, the State Department acknowledged that Hamas diverted a shipment of goods from U.S. charities before eventually surrendering it. Spokesperson Matthew Miller called it “unacceptable” and declared, “they certainly should refrain from doing that in the future.” The government later announced more aid worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
The U.S. knew what it was getting into from the first $100 million package sent. An inspector general’s office warned officials in November that Gaza is “high-risk for potential diversion and misuse of” the aid. It pointed out the danger of relying on humanitarian workers to deliver resources on the ground when they are under the coercion of “armed groups.”
As a U.S. diplomat acknowledged in February, Hamas’s total control of Gaza means it determines “where and to whom assistance goes.” Though Hamas has spent years stealing from its impoverished people, the U.S. essentially trusts the terrorist group to handle it in good faith.
To his credit, Biden did try to get creative with his methods in sending aid, but they too ended in disaster. He built a floating pier on the Mediterranean Sea earlier this year, despite some officials warning it would be structurally unstable and vulnerable. It quickly fell apart and mobs of Palestinians looted the supplies.
This security problem didn’t begin with the current Gaza conflict. The Biden-Harris administration acknowledged a “high risk” of Hamas benefiting from aid programs in 2021 and still rubber-stamped them months later.
The president acts as if the mere gesture of sending relief is all that matters, but real lives are at stake, both at home and abroad. Our leaders should be held accountable for the millions of dollars in aid that are falling into the hands of terrorists.
Americans who pay for these shipments deserve to know where they are going and whether they are reaching their destinations. But due to the media’s silence on the topic, and the ineptitude of our federal bureaucracy, getting answers is all but impossible.
Over the past year, I’ve filed public records requests with the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development, asking for documents of employees’ communications related to the first package Biden announced in October. Both agencies have dragged on the task of finding the records for several months, ignoring or denying my requests for “expedited processing” which agencies are legally obliged to meet. So far, I’ve received only a small batch of records with loads of redactions. They revealed nothing important about how officials rationalized sending aid despite the risks at play.
Through humanitarian aid, the U.S. wants to portray itself as solving everyone’s problems on both sides of the war. What it is actually signaling to the world is incompetence, apathy, and lack of transparency.
If the Biden-Harris administration cannot send aid without effectively funding its own enemies, it should stop playing the generous benefactor. At the very least, the president and his bureaucrats should have to explain themselves.
Hudson Crozier is a contributor to Young Voices and the associate editor at Upward News. His reporting and commentary have been published in the Washington Examiner, the Federalist, the College Fix, and others. He studies journalism at the University of North Texas. Follow him on X @L0neStarTrooper.
