A leader of the humanitarian arm of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch and All the East, or GOPA-DERD, said: “After the suspension of U.S. humanitarian assistance funds last January, GOPA-DERD had to drastically reduce the scale and scope of our programs for Syrian families and Iraqi refugees residing in Syria. To receive the Trump Administration's ‘lifesaving assistance’ waiver for the remainder of our allocated funding, we were forced to end our educational and psychosocial support programs — including tuition assistance, psychological counselling and medications, case management, and gender-based violence services. We were notified we will no longer receive funding from the U.S. government, and thousands of people are left without crucial services necessary to rebuild their lives after a catastrophic civil war.”