{"id":20324,"date":"2017-01-25T05:54:42","date_gmt":"2017-01-25T05:54:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/?p=20324"},"modified":"2017-01-25T05:55:44","modified_gmt":"2017-01-25T05:55:44","slug":"state-dept-reviewing-last-minute-220m-payment-to-gaza-recovery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/news\/state-dept-reviewing-last-minute-220m-payment-to-gaza-recovery.html","title":{"rendered":"State Dept. reviewing last-minute $220M payment to Gaza recovery"},"content":{"rendered":"<div align=\"Justify\">\n<h2><span style=\"font-size: 18pt;\"><strong><span style=\"font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\">State Dept. reviewing last-minute $220M payment to Gaza recovery<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\"><strong>State Dept. reviewing last-minute $220M payment to Gaza recovery:-<\/strong> The State Department is reviewing a $220.3 million payment secretary of State John Kerry authorized for Gaza Recovery programs, a spokesman said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Kerry instructed the U.S. Agency for International Development to release the money for Gaza recovery programs as his final act in office, spokesman Mark Toner said in a statement. He formally notified Congress the department would release the money Friday morning, hours before President Trump&#8217;s inauguration.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\">&#8220;The Department of State is currently reviewing last minute spending approved by the previous administration and will make adjustments if needed to ensure that it aligns with the priorities of the Trump-Pence administration,&#8221; Toner said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Although Congress had approved the Palestinian funding in 2015 and 2016, at least two GOP lawmakers placed holds on it because of the Palestinian Authority&#8217;s requests to join international organizations. Congressional holds aren&#8217;t legally binding by the executive branch, but they&#8217;re usually respected.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\">\u201cI am deeply disappointed that President Obama defied congressional oversight and released $221 million to the Palestinian territories,&#8221; said Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, one of the House members who placed the holds. She called the Obama administration&#8217;s move &#8220;inappropriate.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, also opposed the allocation of funds.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\">The written notification to Congress states the money will be used to fund humanitarian aid in the West Bank and Gaza, as well as to support political and security reforms and to help prepare for good governance and the rule of law in a future Palestinian state.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 8pt; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Source:-\u00a0http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/politics\/onpolitics\/2017\/01\/24\/state-dept-reviewing-kerrys-last-minute-220m-payment-gaza-recovery\/97017096\/<\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"fb-background-color\">\n\t\t\t  <div \n\t\t\t  \tclass = \"fb-comments\" \n\t\t\t  \tdata-href = \"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/news\/state-dept-reviewing-last-minute-220m-payment-to-gaza-recovery.html\"\n\t\t\t  \tdata-numposts = \"10\"\n\t\t\t  \tdata-lazy = \"true\"\n\t\t\t\tdata-colorscheme = \"light\"\n\t\t\t\tdata-order-by = \"social\"\n\t\t\t\tdata-mobile=true>\n\t\t\t  <\/div><\/div>\n\t\t  <style>\n\t\t    .fb-background-color {\n\t\t\t\tbackground: #ffffff !important;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t.fb_iframe_widget_fluid_desktop iframe {\n\t\t\t    width: 630px !important;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t  <\/style>\n\t\t  ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>State Dept. reviewing last-minute $220M payment to Gaza recovery State Dept. reviewing last-minute $220M payment to Gaza recovery:- The State Department is reviewing a $220.3 million payment secretary of State John Kerry authorized for Gaza Recovery programs, a spokesman said. Kerry instructed the U.S. Agency for International Development to release [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20327,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[12462,12463,6219,8895,8861,8719,12461],"class_list":["post-20324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-gaza","tag-gaza-recovery","tag-john-kerry","tag-president-obama","tag-president-trump","tag-state-department","tag-state-dept-reviewing-last-minute-220m-payment-to-gaza-recovery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20327"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}