US Says Prepared For More Funding Cuts In Case Of Palestine Vote

The United States said on Tuesday that it is prepared to cut off funding for other international organizations in case they followed UNESCO in accepting Palestine as a member state.

“Our position on this has not changed. We think that this was the wrong move at the wrong time, and we have made that view clear. We made it clear yesterday, and our view has not changed overnight”, said State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland in a press briefing.

“We have made absolutely clear to the Palestinians, we are making clear to our partners around the world that we oppose continuing this effort in other UN organizations, and we are prepared to maintain the same position if this comes up in other places”, she added.

The US announced yesterday it will cut off USD 60 million of its annual contribution to UNESCO after the international organization voted to accept Palestine as a member state.

Nuland explained this decision by noting that it was taken “because we have legislation on the books; we have US law that requires this in the event of any effort to gain statehood this way. And we were absolutely clear about that before it happened”.

“At the same time, we believe that the security support that the United States provides to the Palestinian Authority supports peace and increasing strength of local authorities to provide for the security of their own people, and that’s very important”, she concluded.