The leaders of seven Arab countries had talks in Saudi Arabia to try to make a plan for the future of Gaza.
Friday, the Rally in Riyadh was supposed to respond to a plan raised by American president Donald Trump so that the United States “takes over” Gaza, definitively move its residents of force and transform the Palestinian enclave into “stream” of the means -East.
Arab leaders have completely rejected Trump’s proposal, saying that she is throwing decades of work towards Palestinian self -determination, walking on the rights of Gaza residents and will perpetuate a regional cycle of violence.
They hope to present an alternative plan with unified support at a meeting of the Arab League on March 4 in Cairo, Egypt.
Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman called Riyadh’s meeting, to whom King Jordan Abdullah II, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sissi, Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim Bin Bin Hamad Al Thani, President Uikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Kuwaiti Emir Meshal al-Ahmad al Sabah and the crown prince of Bahrain Salman Bin Hamad Al Khalifa.
No official meeting of the meeting had been published on Friday by any of the countries involved, and it was only clear that if details of a plan had been accepted.
Looking for a “united front”
Reporting from Riyadh, the Ahelbarra Hachem of Tel Aviv Tribune said that Friday’s meeting had started with the presentation of a reconstruction plan developed by Egypt and envisaged as part of a three-phase ceasefire agreement Between Hamas and Israel.
Only the first phase of this agreement, which has seen a break in the fighting and the exchange of captives, has so far been agreed. A second phase would see a complete end of the fighting, while a third phase aims to approach the reconstruction of the devastated Palestinian enclave.
Ahelbarra said that Arab leaders hoped to develop the Egyptian plan before the Cairo meeting, so that they could “put a united front with a new proposal that can be easily sold to the Americans and the international public”.
“We are talking about extremely difficult things that could shape the whole region for many years to come,” he said.
It remains to decide how reconstruction would be funded in a plan led by the Arabs, he added. Earlier this week, the World Bank, the United Nations and the European Union said it cost more than $ 53 billion to rebuild Gaza, including $ 20 billion in the first three years.
Any reconstruction plan also rides the broader questions of Gaza’s political and security control at the end of the war, said Ahelbarra.
Addressing Tel Aviv Tribune, the former Egyptian Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hussein Haridy, said that the rally is “a crucial moment for the Palestinians and for the Arab nations”.
“Let me quote William Shakespeare is” to be, or not to be “for the Arab world today,” he said.
“Because if Trump’s proposal had just brought the day, it would be the end of the struggle – the Arab struggle and the Palestinian struggle – seven decades.”
Israel and many of its Western allies have rejected the prospect that Hamas is in control of the enclave after the war. Israel also rejected the Palestinian authority by taking control of Gaza, despite more support from the international community for this possibility.
Observers say that the urgency of reaching an agreement is particularly acute for Egypt and Jordan, which Trump has forced to accept the Palestinians in mass.
The American president threatened to retain hundreds of millions of dollars in help if they do not comply. The two countries have rejected the program.
Alternative to Trump
For its part, Cairo has not publicly published its preliminary reconstruction plan.
However, the former Egyptian diplomat Mohamed Hegazy had previously described a plan in what he described as “three technical phases over a period of three to five years”.
A six-month first phase would focus on “early recovery” and deletion of debris, he said.
The second phase would see an international conference stating a detailed plan to restore infrastructure and rebuild Gaza.
A final phase would see the supply of housing and services and the creation of a “political path to implement the solution to two states,” he said, referring to a possible Palestinian state.
Addressing Tel Aviv Tribune, Abdulaziz al-Ghashian, Director of research at the Riyadic observer foundation, said all the countries involved in the Friday meeting determine how to react to a “administration in the -Unis who is almost proud to try to support (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu blindly. “
“And we have a Prime Minister in Israel who really tries to try his luck and maximize his efforts,” he said.
Al-Gashian said that any plan led by the Arabs “cannot discern between the economy, politics and security”, including a path to Palestinian self-determination.
“The reality is that all these things are very interconnected,” he said. “And we have to start thinking about it in a more interconnected and synergistic way.”
