washington | Spending on Israel remains strong in President Bush’s proposed budget, but domestic programs are under the knife, including those that most affect Jewish lives.
Surveying the details in the budget Bush handed to Congress on Monday, Feb. 2, Jewish organizational officials were especially worried about funding for the elderly.
In Israel aid, Bush is proposing $2.58 billion for fiscal year 2005, which formally starts on Oct. 1 this year.
That includes $360 million for economic aid and $2.22 billion in defense aid. The figures are consistent with the seventh year of an aid restructuring program agreed to by the two governments, gradually reducing economic assistance to Israel while increasing military aid.
Aid to Egypt, at just over $1.8 billion, is down $40 million from last year; and aid to Jordan — $456 million — remains unchanged.
In addition, the administration is requesting $75 million, the same as last year, for assistance programs to benefit Palestinians. The money goes straight to non-governmental organizations and is banned from going to the Palestinian Authority. Some Palestinian groups have said they would decline the money because they would not sign a pledge renouncing affiliation with terrorist groups.
Also unaffected is $50 million for refugee resettlement in Israel, primarily for Ethiopian immigrants. Pro-Israel officials were not commenting publicly on the figures, but were quietly expressing satisfaction that the numbers remained steady.
The State Department also is budgeting $25 million to explain U.S. policy — including support for Israel — to the Islamic world.
The “Partnerships for Learning” program is a “vehicle for positive dialogue and constructive action, particularly in the Islamic world, between the U.S. and other countries, especially where divergent views on specific policies (Arab-Israeli conflict, Iraq, corruption, human rights, rule of law, debt relief, terrorism, proliferation issues) often undermine overall good relations,” the budget proposal says.
Such expenditures reflect the budget’s overall priority: protecting Americans at home and abroad.
The vast majority of the increases in Bush’s $2.4 trillion budget are for defense and homeland security needs. Domestically, few programs outside the Education Department get perks, and a number of social service programs are targeted for elimination.
That’s bad news for Jewish social services, which rely on federal money for about 60 percent of their funding — about $6 billion out of $10 billion per year for spending on nursing homes, hospitals and services for the elderly, according to unofficial figures.
“Looking at the budget as a whole, we’re concerned that it would freeze non-defense and non-security programs,” said Charles Konigsberg, the top Washington lobbyist for the United Jewish Communities, the umbrella group of the North American Jewish federation system.
Konigsberg outlined several areas of Jewish concern directly affected by the budget:
• President Bush will not extend emergency federal contributions to Medicaid beyond June. The emergency contributions to the program, which deals with the poor and the disabled, were introduced last year to address the fiscal crisis in the states, which has not abated.
• Cuts in the Health and Human Services budget are likely to adversely affect the Naturally Occurring Retirement Communities program pioneered, to great acclaim, by the UJC and member federations. The program, which brings services to elderly people not ready to leave their communities, has been emulated by other groups.
• Cuts in the Department of Transportation budget target transportation for the elderly, despite advocacy in Congress last year for substantial increases.
One bright light, Konigsberg said, is $80 million earmarked for elderly immigrants, which will extend a seven-year assistance program to immigrants who have not yet become citizens.