Photo from USAID website
The US Agency for International Development (USAID) announced on Wednesday that it had awarded a further $67 million in humanitarian aid to Lebanon, in a statement published on the website of the US Embassy in Beirut.
This announcement brings the total amount of aid given to Lebanon by the US since the fiscal year 2023 to $157 million, which is closely controlled by the US Congress. It is intended for the country's "vulnerable populations," both Lebanese and Syrian.
According to the press release, this additional funding will enable USAID's partners, including the United Nations World Food Program (WFP), to continue providing "emergency food assistance, nutritional support, emergency health care, humanitarian protection and psychological support, as well as water, sanitation and hygiene services" for several months to the populations concerned, including "more than 500,000 people, of whom more than 200,000 are Lebanese citizens," the remainder of the beneficiaries of this aid being Syrian refugees.
This new aid was motivated by ''the insecurity in South Lebanon," said the statement, while aiming to ''meet the urgent humanitarian assistance needs of the 91,000 internally displaced persons since October 2023''.
USAID added, however, that "the ability of relief agencies to support current beneficiaries could diminish in the absence of additional funding, and calls "urgently on other donors to join efforts to intensify the response to these urgent needs and prevent further deterioration of the humanitarian situation in Lebanon."
This article originally appeared in French in L'Orient-Le Jour.