US orders halt to virtually all foreign aid except for Israel and Egypt

[Celerity]

Internal memo to US state department staff explicitly makes exceptions for military assistance to Israel and Egypt

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/24/foreign-aid-israel-egypt

The secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has ordered a halt to virtually all US foreign aid, but made an exception for funding to Israel and Egypt, according to an internal memo to staff at the US state department.

“No new funds shall be obligated for new awards or extensions of existing awards until each proposed new award or extension has been reviewed and approved … as consistent with President Trump’s agenda,” said the memo.

The sweeping order appears to affect everything from development assistance to military aid – including potentially to Ukraine, which received billions of dollars in weapons under Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden as it tries to repel a Russian invasion.

But the memo explicitly made exceptions for military assistance to Israel – whose longstanding major arms packages from the US have expanded further since the Gaza war – and Egypt, which has received generous US defense funding since it signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979.

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