WASHINGTON: Democratic vice-presidential nominee Kamala Harris recently said that if Joe Biden is elected US president, he will restore economic assistance to Palestinians and reopen the Palestine Liberation Organization office in Washington.
While talking to media, she said that they would take immediate steps to restore economic and humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people, address the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and work to reopen the PLO mission in Washington DC.
If taken, the moves will reverse the steps taken by the Trump administration, which cut more than $225 million in aid to the West Bank and Gaza as well as to Palestinians in East Jerusalem in 2018.
It also halted an estimated $360 million per year in US funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, saying that the organisation was “irredeemably flawed”.
Harris also said the Biden administration would reopen the US consulate in East Jerusalem. The Trump administration closed the consulate last year.
President Trump and Democratic challenger Biden are battling it out for the White House, with polls closed across the United States Tuesday — and a long night of waiting for results in key battlegrounds on the cards.
The results are flowing in, with US media projecting wins for the Republican incumbent so far in 22 states including big prize Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio and Tennessee — all states he won in 2016.
