At least 50 Palestinians injured by Israeli forces in Gaza

Israeli soldiers injured 50 Palestinians with live bullets on the 22nd Friday of anti-occupation rallies that have been ongoing since March 30.

In a statement, Gaza’s Health Ministry said the Palestinians were injured at the eastern Gaza border.

It did not disclose information about the condition of the injured. It added that 139 Palestinians were also affected by tear gas.

Protesters demand the “right of return” to their homes and villages in historical Palestine from which they were driven in 1948 to make way for the new state of Israel.

They also demand an end to Israel’s 11-year blockade of the Gaza Strip, which has gutted the coastal enclave’s economy and deprived its 2 million inhabitants of basic commodities.

The latest clashes came as the US announced that it was cutting funding to the West Bank and Gaza.

US to 'redirect' over $200 mln in aid from West Bank, Gaza

Since the Gaza rallies began on Mar. 30, more than 170 Palestinian protesters have been killed -- and thousands more injured -- by Israeli army troops deployed along the other side of the buffer zone.

US President Donald Trump has ordered the State Department to "redirect" more than $200 million in economic aid for projects in the West Bank and Gaza to programs elsewhere, a department official said on Friday.

Research Associate in The Arab Gulf States Institute Omar Rahman speaks about the US decision to redirect aid away from the West Bank and Gaza.

"We have undertaken a review of US assistance to the Palestinian Authority and in the West Bank and Gaza to ensure these funds are spent in accordance with US national interests and provide value to the US taxpayer," said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"As a result of that review, at the direction of the president, we will redirect more than $200 million in FY2017 Economic Support Funds originally planned for programs in the West Bank and Gaza. Those funds will now address high-priority projects elsewhere."

The official added that the decision took into account "the challenges the international community faces in providing assistance in Gaza, where Hamas control endangers the lives of Gaza’s citizens and degrades an already dire humanitarian and economic situation."

The official did not say to where the funds would be redirected.

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency and the Palestinians have warned that cuts could exacerbate hardship in Gaza, an enclave that has been under Israeli and Egypt blockades designed to isolate its Islamist Hamas rulers.

US National Security adviser John Bolton told Reuters this week that UNRWA, which extends aid to Palestinians displaced by the 1948 war of Israel's founding and to millions of their descendants, was "a failed mechanism" that violated standard international law on the status of refugees.

"I think it is long overdue that we have taken steps to reduce funding," Bolton said, adding that "much of UNRWA's expenses really go to perpetuating the refugee status of the Palestinian people."