I 
115TH CONGRESS 
2D SESSION 
H. R. 6451 
To establish the policy of the United States with respect to contributions 
to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees 
in the Near East, and for other purposes. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JULY 19, 2018 
Mr. LAMBORN (for himself, Mr. WEBER of Texas, Mr. DESJARLAIS, Mr. 
PERRY, Mr. MCKINLEY, and Ms. TENNEY) introduced the following bill; 
which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs 
A BILL 
To establish the policy of the United States with respect 
to contributions to the United Nations Relief and Works 
Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, and 
for other purposes. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘UNRWA Reform and 
Refugee Support Act of 2018’’. 
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 
Congress finds the following: 
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(1) The United Nations Relief and Works 
Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East 
(UNRWA) was founded in 1949 through United Na-
tions General Assembly Resolution 302 at the con-
clusion of the Arab-Israeli Conflict of 1948 to ‘‘al-
leviate the conditions of starvation and distress 
among the Palestine refugees’’ from that conflict. 
(2) According to UNRWA’s Consolidated Eligi-
bility and Registration Instructions (CERI), Pales-
tinian refugees are ‘‘persons whose normal place of 
residence was Palestine during the period 1 June 
1946 to 15 May 1948, and who lost both home and 
means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 conflict’’. 
(3) Beginning in the 1950s, UNRWA changed 
the eligibility requirements to be a Palestinian ref-
ugee from those displaced in 1948 that is incon-
sistent with the original definition of the agency. 
This change significantly inflated the number of 
purported refugees and subsequently the number of 
individuals who are eligible to receive UNRWA bene-
fits. UNRWA classifies individuals eligible for bene-
fits as Palestinian refugees including, but not lim-
ited to, those ‘‘descendants of Palestine refugee 
males, including legally adopted children’’, several 
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generations removed from the conflict, who were 
born decades after the conflict ended. 
(4) This classification process is inconsistent 
with how all other refugees in the world are classi-
fied, including the definition used by the United Na-
tions High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) and 
the laws concerning refugees in the United States. 
Because of UNRWA’s unique definition of a refugee, 
the number of Palestinian refugees has grown expo-
nentially over the years, from approximately 600,000 
in 1949 to 5,300,000 today. In contrast the number 
of refugees from other conflicts has diminished dra-
matically through UNHCR. 
(5) Instead of resettling Palestinian refugees 
displaced as a result of the Arab-Israeli Conflict of 
1948, UNRWA provides aid to those they define as 
Palestinian refugees until there is a solution they 
deem acceptable to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. 
This policy does not help resettle the refugees from 
1948 but instead maintains a refugee population in 
perpetuity. 
(6) The United States has been UNRWA’s big-
gest donor since its inception, and contributes a dis-
proportionate amount on Palestinian refugees in 
comparison to other refugees around the world. The 
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