Motives and Implications of America’s Withdrawal from 66 International Organizations
(Translated)

Al-Rayah Newspaper - Issue 585 - 04/02/2026

By: Ustaadh Ahmed al-Khatwani

After President Donald Trump signed a presidential memorandum ordering the United States to withdraw from 66 international organizations on the grounds that they no longer serve American interests, the Director-General of the World Health Organization, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, warned on Tuesday (13/01/2026) that Washington’s decision to withdraw from the organization, which officially took effect this January, will make the United States and the world unsafe. Tedros said, “it’s not really the right decision,” expressing his hope that the United States would reconsider its decision and return to the organization. He added that a large part of the work that the World Health Organization does is beneficial to the United States, “Withdrawal from WHO is a loss for the United States… there are many things done through WHO that benefit the United States, especially in health security… the U.S. cannot be safe without working with WHO.”

This withdrawal encompasses 35 organizations not affiliated with the United Nations and 31 entities affiliated with the United Nations. On 7 January 2026, the U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio commented on the memorandum, saying, “President Trump announced the withdrawal of the United States from 66 international organizations identified as part of the Trump Administration’s review of wasteful, ineffective, and harmful international organizations. Review of additional international organizations pursuant to Executive Order 14199 remains ongoing.”

The international organizations from which America withdrew range from those concerned with climate, energy, and the environment, to those dealing with women and population issues such as UN Women and the United Nations Population Fund, or legal organizations such as the International Development Law Organization (IDLO), or even agriculture-related bodies, such as the International Cotton Advisory Committee, along with many other diverse international organizations.

CNN quoted White House sources as saying that this withdrawal will end the funding and participation of American taxpayers in entities that promote globalization agendas, at the expense of U.S. priorities, that it is preferable to direct American taxpayers’ money in other ways, and that this withdrawal will fulfill a fundamental promise made by President Trump to the American people, namely, to stop supporting global bureaucrats who work against the interests of the nation and that the Trump administration will always place the slogan “America First” at the forefront.

These sudden, mass withdrawals by the U.S. from dozens of international organizations effectively mark the beginning of the practical dismantling of the current international order, and represent a genuine prelude to the creation of new international organizations, based on entirely different foundations.

For example, among the organizations from which Trump withdrew are those related to European partners, such as the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats, the Forum of European National Highway Research Laboratories, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe, and others. All of these withdrawals indicate a clear American break from the Europeans.

As for globalization and all that it entails, in terms of intertwined interests and relations among the countries of the world, America has withdrawn from everything connected to it, to global cooperation, and to international relations, such as the International Trade Centre, the UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the Freedom Online Coalition (FOC), the Global Community Engagement and Resilience Fund (GCERF), the Global Counterterrorism Forum, the Global Forum on Cyber Expertise (GFCE), the Global Forum on Migration and Development, the Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research, the Intergovernmental Forum on Mining, Minerals, Metals and Sustainable Development (IGF), the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, and the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property.

In doing so, the U.S. severed all ties of cooperation with the international order and focused instead on unilateral or bilateral international relations, disregarding all efforts to foster closer global relations between states and societies.

In addition, the United States withdrew from international organizations concerned with Latin America, Africa, and Asia, such as the UN Economic Commission for Africa, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia. All these withdrawals pertain to Asian, African, and Latin American countries because the United States prefers bilateral relations with these nations, and does not want to establish international relations with them.

Even shared Western civilizational concepts, which the West seeks to make universal, have been disregarded by the United States. It withdrew from the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, the International Institute for Justice and the Rule of Law, the United Nations Democracy Fund (UNDEF), the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations, and the International Law Commission. Thus, the United Nations organizations, their laws, their agreements, and adherence to them have become unimportant to the United States, and consequently, no longer binding on the rest of the world. The United States has stripped them of their binding force, thereby diminishing their prestige, undermining their sovereignty, and destroying their authority.

After this collapse, the world's nations can now seek new frameworks, new norms, and new organizations. America, by withdrawing from its position as the world's leading power, and the guarantor of the current international order, has provided the world, its nations, and its societies with the pretext to begin searching for alternatives and new civilizational and legal frameworks.

The truth is that the countries and peoples of the world today have nothing to fill this void except Islam with its Aqeedah and Shariah rulings, because of its ability to offer alternatives with its ideas, proposals, and state, and to serve as the civilizational and legal alternative that is acceptable to all societies and peoples of the earth.