USAID GAVE $3 MILLION TO VICIOUS ANTI-ISRAEL RAPPER

USAID gave $3million to Gaza rapper who produced antisemitic songs, Republican lawmaker Mike Lawler claims

 

By Alyssa Guzman 

Daily Mail

Feb 13, 2025

Representative Mike Lawler, 38, (pictured) slammed USAID for providing Tomorrow's Youth Organization, an NGO that helps Palestinian youth, with a $3.3million grant in 2022

 

The beleaguered United States Agency for International Development (USAID) paid $3.3million to an organization headed by a rapper who released antisemitic songs, a Republican lawmaker claimed.

New York Rep. Mike Lawler, 38, slammed the agency for providing Tomorrow's Youth Organization, an NGO that helps Palestinian youth, with the multimillion-dollar grant in 2022, he said in a press release. 

The Republican called the organization's executive director, American-born Raffoul Saadeh, a 'vicious anti-Israel rapper who advocates for Jew hatred in his music.'

'[He] has a long history of antisemitism, comparing the Palestinian experience to that of the Jews in Auschwitz,' the release said. 

The lawmaker cited three songs from Saadeh - Scars of Gaza, From the Ghetto, and Tears over Palestine - in which the rapper 'verbally assaults Israel and Jewish people,' the statement said.

Lawler linked to three apparent music videos for the songs, but none of them were available as of Thursday morning. 

The release also linked to a March 2024 report by the New York Sun, which said that Saadeh's song Scars of Gaza included the lyric: 'Auschwitz reincarnated brought back to life by the victims who were burned by the Nazis.' 

It also said a video for the song that was posted but subsequently deleted online 'ends with a call for violence.'

 

The Republican called the organization's executive director, American-born Raffoul Saadeh (pictured), a 'vicious anti-Israel rapper who advocates for Jew hatred in his music.' 

 

DailyMail.com has reached out to Saadeh for comment. 

In his 2014 song Tears over Palestine, viewed by DailyMail.com, Saadeh rapped: 'Imagine Arabic Anne Frank writing her journal / Imagine Arab babies getting tossed in infernos / The Holocaust of Palestine / What a vicious circle.

'My anger runs deep and my emotions are numb, so a middle finger to that solider holding that gun.'

Later in the song, Saadeh raps: 'I can't forget my brother, the past, I'll see him in paradise / I hope to see his killer's corpse seen by parasites.' 

Lawler's New York district is one of the most Jewish in the country. The congressman himself is a practicing Catholic. 

'USAID giving $3.3 million to an organization headed by a vicious anti-Israel rapper is beyond the pale and emblematic of the problems that can exist when transparency is lacking in our government,' Lawler added in in a press release. 

'Tomorrow's Youth's Executive Director compares the Palestinian experience to that of the Jews in Auschwitz is disgusting and calls into question the decision-making process by those at USAID.

'We cannot allow the antisemitism and anti-Israel bias that has run rampant throughout the UN and other international organizations to infect our institutions here in the United States.' 

Lawler called for the Trump Administration to look into USAID to 'get to the bottom of why the Biden Administration was funding Jew hatred.' 

 

'[He] has a long history of antisemitism, comparing the Palestinian experience to that of the Jews in Auschwitz,' the congressman's press release said

The press release pointed to a 2024 report by the New York Sun, which claimed the Georgetown graduate's song Scars of Gaza included the lyric: 'Auschwitz reincarnated brought back to life by the victims who were burned by the Nazis' 

 

In 2015 Saahed - who was born in Connecticut before moving to Palestine at seven months old - joined BBC to talk about the conflict. 

The Christian Palestinian said he was being 'discriminated against by the system.' 

'Here, I am seeing soldiers, I see armies being taught to differentiate between an Arab and an Israeli,' he told the outlet. 'That's what I'm opposing.' 

He also called for the mistakes of Israel to be 'called out.' 

'When you say the Palestinian leadership makes mistakes, the Israeli leadership is also filled with mistakes,' he told BBC nearly a year after releasing Tears of Palestine. 'The system makes us [Palestinians and Israelis] hate each other. 

'And I feel that's the gap we need to adverse. Every human being can love one another; everybody wants to live, laugh, and love, but you need you need to start speaking to the other side. 

'And when there's a wall separating two groups of people, you can't speak to the other side.'

The Trump Administration fired the inspector general of USAID just a day after he issued a sharp warning about the state of affairs within the organization.

 

Saahed now is the executive director of Tomorrow's Youth

 

Inspector General Paul Martin was dumped on Tuesday via an email from the deputy director of the Office of Presidential Personnel, which said his role was 'terminated, effective immediately.'

One day earlier, Martin had released a report warning that President Trump's dismantling of the organization, with the help of Elon Musk-led DOGE, had made it all but impossible to monitor $8.2billion in unspent humanitarian funds.

Inspectors general are typically independently funded watchdogs attached to government agencies and tasked with rooting out waste, fraud and abuse.

The Trump Administration earlier purged more than a dozen inspectors general, but Martin had been spared even as his department came under scrutiny for wasteful spending.

Martin's office issued a flash report warning that the Trump Administration's freeze on all foreign assistance and moves to cut USAID staff had left oversight of the humanitarian aid 'largely nonoperational.'

That includes the agency's ability to ensure none of the funding falls into the hands of violent extremist groups or goes astray in conflict zones, the watchdog said.

A spokesman for the USAID Office of Inspector General confirmed Martin's role had been terminated. They gave no reason for the decision.