President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, the international body overseeing the reconstruction of Gaza, came out of the gate with flashy announcements and big plans.
The group claimed $17 billion had been pledged to support rebuilding efforts. Earlier this year, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner outlined a 100-day sprint to get aid into Gaza and a “masterplan” for the region, imagining the territory as a Dubai-like, futuristic coastal outpost of skyscrapers and seaside resorts.
On the ground — as with many of the president’s biggest diplomatic boasts — things haven’t quite matched the hype, with the board reportedly struggling to get even a modest pilot program for a displaced persons camp up and running.
Following recent discussions in Cyprus, the board is looking to stand up a camp serving tens of thousands of people near the city of Rafah, overseen by an international security force and a newly trained group of Palestinian police officers.
However, many of the plan’s key elements reportedly remain in limbo.
Aid reportedly continues to only trickle in, and the Israeli government has apparently not cleared the International Stabilization Force (ISF) or the police force for operation inside the territory, nor has it allowed the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, a technocratic body overseeing parts of governance in the territory, from operating on the ground in Gaza.
Major preparatory work on the pilot camp and a support base for the ISF has not begun, The Guardian reports.
“The humanitarian catastrophe cannot be managed through fragmented or partial measures. At the same time, every effort that genuinely saves Palestinian lives deserves careful consideration,” the Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister Varsen Aghabekian told the outlet. “Our concern, however, is that temporary arrangements must never become a substitute for a comprehensive solution or serve to normalize an unacceptable reality.”
Requests for proposals on the initial work have only just gone out, the Jerusalem News Syndicate reports.
The Independent has contacted the U.S. State Department for comment.
Substantial progress on the early-stage camp is not expected until after Israeli elections in late October, which could yield a disruptive change in leadership, prolonging the suffering for the more than 2 million displaced people in Gaza.
Making matters worse, both Hamas and Israel accuse the other of violating the terms of the underlying ceasefire, imperiling longer-term development plans.
Further, negotiations around Hamas and other groups fully disarming remain stalled.
Nickolay Mladenov, the Board of Peace’s high representative for the Gaza Strip, has said Hamas and other groups fully disarming is a precondition for the strip receiving full reconstruction support.
As of early June, the World Bank reportedly had not received any of the billions of dollars in contributions from donor countries backing the rebuilding effort, including the United States.
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