The U.S. will provide an additional $439 million in aid to Syria, the State Department announced Tuesday, bringing the total amount of humanitarian aid since the 2011 start of the crisis ito $5.6 billion.
The additional funding, announced by Secretary of State John Kerry, is meant to provide food, shelter, drinking water, medical care and protection services to Syrians. It also will help communities that are hosting the estimated 4.8 million Syrian refugees in the region.
The State Department included in its report a call to groups to “cease unlawful attacks on civilians” and “comply with international law.” Syrian leader Bashar Assad and his supporters use starvation as a weapon and target civilians in schools, mosques, markets and hospitals, according to the State Department. Meanwhile, terrorist groups such as the Islamic State are “brutalizing Syrians daily.”
President Obama’s goal is to settle 10,000 Syrian refugees in the United States this year.
Donald Trump, however, has compared allowing Syrian refugees into the country to a “Trojan horse” where terrorists will sneak into the country posing as refugees.
“We cannot let them into this country, period. Our country has tremendous problems. We can’t have another problem,” the presumptive Republican presidential nominee said in November.
