LONDON: US-based aid group Heal Palestine has said it is “distressed” after a far-right influencer convinced Secretary of State Marco Rubio to stop granting visas to Palestinians seeking medical treatment in America.
Laura Loomer, a social media personality and self-described “proud Islamophobe,” told the New York Times that she had spoken to Rubio on Friday about the threat of “Islamic invaders” using medical visas as a route to the US.
Heal Palestine focuses on bringing severely ill children to the US “on temporary visas for essential medical treatment not available at home,” the group said in a statement.
“After their treatment is complete, the children and any accompanying family members return to the Middle East,” it added. “This is a medical treatment program, not a refugee resettlement program.”
Another group started by Heal Palestine’s founder Steve Sosebee, the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund, gained national attention when it helped bring a 2-year-old Palestinian girl named Rahaf and her mother Israa Saed to St. Louis, Missouri, to be fitted with prosthetic legs.
