OKLAHOMA CITY (Feb. 1, 2024) – Attorney General Gentner Drummond and 25 other attorneys general are asking U.S. Congressional leadership to defund the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) due to its ties to terrorism.

In a letter today, the multi-state coalition outlined UNRWA’s role in diverting money intended for education and civil works to material support for kidnapping, torture and murder.

“Our government finds itself in a strange situation when it prosecutes people for the crime of providing material support to terrorists but simultaneously sending more than $6 billion to an organization that we know employs terrorists. That must stop,” the letter states.

UNRWA announced on Jan. 26 that it fired more than a dozen employees for participating in the Hamas terrorist massacre against Israel on Oct. 7. UNRWA’s ties to terrorism are nothing new. UNRWA employed one school principal who moonlit as an Islamic Jihad bomber and another who was a Hamas commandant. One UNRWA school teacher is accused of detaining an Oct. 7 hostage for nearly two months. In a shocking report, it also was revealed that every UNRWA school the Israeli Defense Forces searched contained hidden weapons.

“With all of the information we have about UNRWA’s despicable actions, we should not be paying the organization a single cent, much less $1 billion,” Drummond said.

In 2018, President Trump recognized UNRWA’s alarming ties with terrorism and stopped all federal funding to the organization. Despite glaring legal and security concerns, President Biden reinstated funding for UNRWA on his first day in office, paying them almost $1 billion dollars during his current term.

In addition to Oklahoma, states joining the letter, which was led by Iowa and South Carolina, include Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia and Wyoming.