White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Tuesday revealed that Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s recent suspension of foreign assistance included the withdrawal of millions of dollars allocated for “condoms in Gaza.”
Leaviit said this while she was briefing about an order from the Office of Management and Budget to temporarily suspend grants, loans and federal assistance programmes. This pause allows for an assessment to determine if the funding aligns with President Donald Trump‘s executive directives, particularly those concerning the elimination of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, the Green New Deal, and support for nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) deemed contrary to national interests.
“If the activity is not in conflict with the President’s priorities, it will continue with no issues. This is similar to how HHS [Department of Health and Human Services] stopped the flow of grant money to the WHO [World Health Organization] after President Trump announced the U.S. withdrawal from the organization. Or how the State Department halted several million dollars going to condoms in Gaza this past weekend,” she said in her first press briefing.
“That is a preposterous waste of taxpayer money. So that’s what this pause is focused on, being good stewards of tax dollars,” Leavitt told reporters.
She revealed that DOGE and OBM identified an additional $37 million that was set to be transferred to the WHO before Trump’s executive order terminated relations with the international health organisation.
In 2020, The Jerusalem Post documented that numerous condoms were being utilised to construct IED-carrying balloons, which would drift towards southern Israel, causing distress in educational facilities, agricultural areas and motorways.
The publication mentioned that these explosive devices, transported by inflated contraceptives into Israel, devastated thousands of hectares of terrain and resulted in “millions of shekels of damage.”
