The closing of USAID damages the prospect of peace and sustainability

The Arava Institute for Environmental Studies has worked with USAID for over two decades, implementing Middle East Regional Cooperation grants whose goals are to foster cross-border cooperation between Israeli scientists and Arab scientists from countries across the Middle East, including Morocco, Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, Turkey, and more recently Gulf Cooperation Council countries. The Arava Institute has also worked with USAID on Conflict Management and Mitigation grants to support Israelis and Palestinians, and Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel to address issues of common environmental concern.

In April of 2023, the Arava Institute applied for a grant from a new USAID program enacted by Congress called the Nita M. Lowey Middle East Partnership for Peace Act (MEPPA). MEPPA’s goal is to expand peace and reconciliation programs between Palestinians and Israelis to build support for a political solution to the conflict. In July 2023, the Institute was asked to submit a full proposal to USAID, and to enter a co-creation stage with USAID staff. Our staff and the USAID staff worked diligently over the summer to finalize a proposal for 2.2 million USD to implement a series of cross-border environmental training and cooperation programs between Palestinians and Israelis in the water, energy, food security, and environmental fields. The grant, called “Harvesting Cooperation through Environmental Action” was a partnership between USAID, the Arava Institute based on Kibbutz Ketura, and two Palestinian NGOs based in Ramallah and Gaza. We received confirmation that the Institute and its Palestinian partners had been awarded the grant on October 3^rd, 2023.

Our celebration was short lived, since only a few days later, our world and the world of our partners was turned upside down by the horrific Hamas terrorist massacre of residents and visitors in the Gaza Envelope inside Israel. Following the events of October 7^th, Israeli armed forces bombed and then invaded Gaza to force Hamas to release the 251 hostages and remove Hamas from power. Our Palestinian partners in Gaza found themselves internally displaced having lost their homes, their livelihoods and many family members. In the fall of 2023, most of our attention and the attention of our partners was focused on finding a way to help our colleagues in Gaza escape the war by getting to Egypt or Europe. As the war dragged on, and more and more Palestinians in Gaza found themselves internally displaced we and our partners worked together to respond to the growing humanitarian crisis.

While our attention has been focused on internally displaced persons caused by the war, the Institute and our Palestinian partners did not abandon the goals of cross-border environmental cooperation around water, energy, food security, and environment (WEFE) through Harvesting Cooperation. The war caused delays in the launch of Harvesting Cooperation but due to the commitment of our partners and the Arava Institute to foster cross-border environmental cooperation despite the political upheaval in the region, by the late spring of 2024, Harvesting Cooperation began to bear fruit. In May 2024, we convened a 5-day workshop for 45 Palestinian and Israeli Bedouin women at the Arava Institute to train in the use of solar energy technology. Following this first successful training workshop, the Arava Institute and our partners implemented a series of USAID funded Palestinian-Israeli training workshops, expert working group meetings, and conferences from May 2024 until December 2024. Up until January 2025, the USAID sponsored Harvesting Cooperation initiative held seven workshops, five expert working group meetings, one 3-month training program, and one regional experts conference and included almost 250 participants from Israel and Palestine. At the end of January, after the announcement came from the Trump Administration that there would be a pause on funding for USAID grants, the Institute, together with its partners, held a cross-border water, energy, food security, and environment (WEFE) expert’s conference in Athens, Greece, hosting 60 Israeli, Palestinian and Jordanian experts.

While shutting down of our USAID grant is a tragedy for the Arava Institute, its staff, its partners, and its beneficiaries in Israel and Palestine, the real victim of this action is the prospect for peace and sustainability in the Middle East. The Nita Lowey Middle East Partnerships for Peace Act (MEPPA) recognized that peace will not come to the Middle East by two leaders simply signing a piece of paper. Peace will come when the people in the region, both Palestinians and Israelis, recognize each other as human beings, recognize our shared stewardship of the environment we inhabit and believe that peace between us is possible. After everything we have been through on and since October 7^th, now more than ever, we need to give people hope and help people believe. It is my understanding that ending war in the Middle East and moving towards normalization of relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors is a top priority for the Trump Administration. Shutting down USAID programs such as MEPPA which promoted Israeli-Palestinian people to people peacebuilding is undermining the Administration’s own goals. The Trump Administration must recognize the important value such a foreign policy soft power tool has for the enhancement of security, economy, and diplomatic relations in the region. Let your congressman, senator, or member of parliament know how important USAID is to peace and sustainability in the Middle East and the world.