Jun 21, 2018

President Donald Trump’s Syria policy is coming under heightened scrutiny from Congress following his decision to freeze $200 million in stabilization aid to Syria.

The purse-string holders in the Senate today cleared an annual foreign aid spending bill that allocates $150 million in Syrian stabilization assistance in an apparent rebuke of Trump’s aid freeze. While Congress has authorized funding to help Syrian civilians rebuild their country since 2013, this is the first time congressional appropriators have mandated stabilization funding levels in the bill.

House lawmakers have also voiced concern about the Syria aid freeze but without mandating funding levels. The lower chamber, however, agrees with the White House that the current regime should not benefit from US funding streams. To that end, the House version of the spending bill, released last week, includes new language stipulating that non-humanitarian assistance “should not be used in areas of Syria controlled by a government led by Bashar al-Assad or associated forces.”

“The directive reflects USAID [US Agency for International Development] policy already in place regarding civilian assistance for Syria, which is to not provide such assistance in areas controlled by the regime,” a staffer on the House Appropriations Committee told Al-Monitor.

While prior spending bills have stipulated that funding is partly intended to “further the legitimacy and viability of the Syrian opposition,” this is the first time House appropriators have explicitly placed limits on non-lethal aid inside Assad-held territory. Previous spending bills have contained provisions on using the money for projects that support “or otherwise legitimize the government of Iran.”