The US Agency for International Development (USAID) opened an office in Palestine in 1994. The website, which is no longer available, has since “helped four million Palestinians live healthier and more productive lives.”
As the agency was shut down by the administration of US President Donald Trump, it relates to assessing the claim that USAID is a force on occupied Palestinian territory.
Without a doubt, the agency closure has affected Palestinians, especially those who benefit from education and healthcare funding. Humanitarian clauses have also been affected, with the world’s food programmes facing major disruptions, one of the leading humanitarian actors of occupied Palestinian territory.
The negative short-term impact is clear, but placing it in the larger political context of Israel’s Palestinian occupation makes the usefulness of USAID and other US funding questionable.
As a researcher, I have been directly and indirectly involved in assessing USAID-funded programs over the years, but have seen first hand how it contributed to the occupation of Israel and the maintenance of colonies. The US institutions were far from living a better life, as the Palestinians argued.
Peace policy
USAID opened offices in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as part of a broader American effort to guide and shape a political reconciliation between Palestinians and Israelis, launched by the 1994 Oslo Agreement.
The so-called “peace process” promised an independent state of the land occupied by Israel in 1967, and a final agreement was to be signed by 1999. Needless to say, such an agreement was never signed, as Israel does not intend to close the peace with the Palestinians and to recognize the right to self-determination.
Instead, Oslo was used to conceal the ruthless colonization of Israel’s occupied Palestinian territory in the rhetoric of peace negotiations. The creation of the Palestinian Authority (PA) as a local governing body tasked with managing civil matters for Palestinians in designated areas was part of this strategy.
The official Palestinian leaders had assumed the PA as a transitional politics that controlled daily life until an independent state was established, but ultimately it was designed and closely supervised to allow the US to function as a client system and manage and control the occupying people.
To this end, the PA was obliged to work closely with Israeli security forces to curb resistance in all forms of controlled territory. Its two major security agencies – intelligence agency and preventive security, were set up to fulfill this obligation.
The US intelligence agency was tasked with supporting and training Palestinian security equipment, which concentrates millions of dollars each year, while USAID was tasked with supporting the private functions of the PA.
Between 1994 and 2018, USAID provided more than $5.2 billion to Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. It funded infrastructure, health and education initiatives with the aim of winning general support for peace negotiations.
Part of that funding was collected through civil society organisations with two main objectives: depoliticizing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and cultivating a network of civil society actors that promote this agenda.
The politicization framework treated the Palestinian issue as an economic and humanitarian issue. This approach addressed economic and social issues in Palestine in isolation. It is separated from the main cause of this, the occupation of Israel.
They also sought to outlaw Palestinian resistance by portraying it as a source of instability and chaos rather than a political response to the occupation.
To distribute funds, USAID, along with Orwell’s conditions, established a complex system of background checks. The review ranged beyond individuals to the large family, the names of the locations, and even the cultural context in which the funds were used.
In this context, it is not surprising that the USAID program often failed to improve the lives of ordinary Palestinians.
Normalization through human-to-human programs
Many USAID funds have entered initiatives that attempt to normalize Israeli colonization by attempting to establish links between Palestinians and Israelis. The premise was that the two of them could “learn to live together.” This, of course, completely ignored the reality of apartheid and occupation.
One of the USAID-funded programs I evaluated was the Dispute Management and Mitigation (CMM) programme, which was promoted under the USAID People’s Partnership Framework. By 2018, CMM was planning to allocate more than $230 million to various initiatives, and distribute an additional $250 million by 2026.
The program included projects that promote peacebuilding for bereaved families, farmers and students. One such project sought to promote cooperation between Palestinians and Israeli farmers through shared agricultural experiences.
During one focus group discussion, I spoke to Palestinian farmers. Palestinian farmers explained that Palestinian olive oil production has stagnated due to the Israeli occupation regime, which restricted access to Palestinian farmers’ water and, in some cases, their land. “These programs,” he said, “Don’t talk about these issues.”
When asked why he took part, he explained that the project allowed him to obtain a travel permit for Israel.
The absurdity of this dynamic was impressive. On paper, the programme has fostered productive relationships between Palestinians and Israelis, and has built a shared, peaceful future where farmers become friends. But in reality, Palestinian farmers were able to sign and work on travel permits and Israeli farms. Many of them were established on confiscated Palestine lands. Participation in the programme did not resolve the problems Palestinian farmers faced with olive agriculture: Israel’s occupation policy.
Another USAID-funded program I learned, Seeds of Peace, had a mission to bring together young people from conflict zones who could become future leaders in their country. The program’s core activity was at youth summer camps in a wealthy area of Maine, USA, where participants engaged in dialogue and leadership training.
The two largest group of participants were Israelis and Palestinians. The Israeli Ministry of Education was responsible for selecting Israeli participants, but the Ramala Peace Bureau seeds oversaw the recruitment of Palestinian participants. Each participant benefited from the granted program, with costs reaching up to $8,000 per person.
A closer look at the participants list over the years revealed impressive patterns. Sons and daughters from PA leaders and wealthy families appeared frequently.
I was interested in this pattern and once asked program executives about it. The response became clear: “In Palestinian society, leadership is often passed on to high-ranking children.”
This means that the vision of the organization – and, in turn, of the Palestinian political leaders assumed that power in Palestinian politics was genetic, and therefore the US initiative should focus on the sons and daughters of the present elite.
Political Interference
Peace Seeds were not the only program that would help support Pae executives and their families. Some relatives of senior officials are given priority in securing advantageous USAID contracts. Others lead nonprofit organizations funded by agents.
USAID is also indirectly involved in the Palestinian political scene by supporting Washington’s favorite political actors.
Between 2004 and 2006, a vast promotion of democracy programme was implemented on Palestinian territory in preparation for the 2006 legislative elections. Although there is no direct evidence of financial support for a particular candidate or party list, observers note that the Fatah-linked civil society organisation (CSO) or third method candidate is the recipient of USAID funding. In some cases, this support was channeled through organizations operating in unrelated sectors.
Despite substantial funding and political support, these groups were unable to secure enough seats to prevent Hamas’ election victory. After Hamas ruled Gaza, USAID continued to support the Palestinian CSO.
USAID also supported PA-based police through the PA’s legal program, where the majority of funding for PA’s repressive security equipment has come through the CIA and the US Department of State’s International Drug Management and Law Enforcement (traditional).
A more recent and prominent example of problematic USAID involvement is the malfunctioning jetty built by the US military in 2024, which will promote the provision of aid to Gaza for $230 million. The project was promoted as a humanitarian initiative, and USAID was one of the organisations tasked with distributing trickles of aid that passed it.
In reality, this pier served as a public relations stunt under the control of former US President Joe Biden to obscure our accomplices in the Israeli Gaza blockade. It was also used by Israeli forces in operations that led to the killing of more than 200 Palestinians and raised serious questions about the militarization and misuse of aid infrastructure.
The pier farce is a great example of the US approach to providing assistance to the Palestinians. It was never done for their greatest benefit.
It is true that some poor Palestinians could be affected by the closure of operations in the West Bank and Gaza. However, it is unlikely that this will change crucially on the ground. The aid cutoff has a more dramatic impact on the US strategy of leveraging Palestinian civil society organizations to promote a peace agenda and perpetuating the air rhetoric of peace.
In this respect, the closure of USAID can provide Palestinian civil society with the opportunity to reconsider its involvement with US government donors in light of its moral obligations to the Palestinian people. It clearly didn’t work that millions had been poured into the settlement. It’s time for a new approach that actually helps the interests of the Palestinians.
The views expressed in this article are the authors themselves and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.