A former Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldier, Asher Fredman, claimed to The New York Post that he discovered USAID humanitarian aid packages amidst a weapons cache belonging to the Hezbollah terror group in an undisclosed village in Lebanon. Fredman, now the executive director of the Misgav Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy, stated that the cache contained sniper rifles, anti-tank missiles, and explosives alongside the care packages marked “USAID.”
Breaking: USAID packages found among Hezbollah weapons cache in Lebanon: Israeli soldier. My latest @nypost co-authored with @isareport .
The US designated the Iran-backed Hezbollah a terrorist entity.https://t.co/0XPSeuy8Dx
— Benjamin Weinthal (@BenWeinthal) February 10, 2025
Fredman suggested that Hezbollah had been using the village as a “forward base” to potentially invade Israel, noting evidence suggests the group was recently there and fled as the IDF approached.
The discovery raises serious questions about the potential diversion of US aid to terrorist organizations. Gerald Steinberg, founder of NGOMonitor, echoed these concerns, stating that US humanitarian aid has been flowing to terrorist groups in the Middle East for years.
These claims come at a time when USAID is facing serious scrutiny, including significant staff cuts and allegations of fraudulent spending. President Trump has also expressed intentions to cut US funding to organizations like the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) after investigations revealed links between its employees and the October 7, 2023, terror attack on Israel.
President Trump is in the process of uncovering the corruption, fraud, and abuse within USAID with the assistance Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which has come under scrutiny in recent days after its work cleaning out government corruption began.
According to The Post, “Last week, the 10,000 strong staff of USAID, most of whom work internationally, was drastically cut to about 300 employees. The agency spent $68 billion in 2023, according to reports.”
President Trump posted on his Truth Social account Friday that “USAID is driving the radical left crazy, and there is nothing they can do about it because the way in which the money has been spent, so much of it fraudulently, is totally unexplainable.”
