The Peace Board for the Gaza Strip announced this Wednesday in New York, coinciding with the 81st General Assembly of the UN, an ambitious reconstruction plan for the Palestinian territory valued at more than 2.4 billion dollars.
The program includes a partial reconstruction of the Strip over a period of six months, with an estimated budget of 2.45 billion dollars (more than 2.15 billion euros). This was detailed by the Board itself in a meeting with donor countries and organizations held in the American city, where the special envoy and son-in-law of Donald Trump, Jared Kushner, intervened.
Within this six-month plan, about 275 million dollars (240 million euros) are reserved for debris removal, in addition to construction projects, humanitarian aid programs, and the creation and deployment of a new police force in the enclave.
According to the Board's calculations, the total cost for the reconstruction of the Strip, devastated by an Israeli military offensive that is approaching its third year, would reach 71 billion dollars (about 62.4 billion euros). To date, the financing commitments gathered are around 18 billion dollars (15.8 billion euros).
The Gaza Peace Board, led by the President of the United States, Donald Trump, held a meeting last July in Cyprus, in a context of paralysis of initiatives aimed at alleviating the severe humanitarian crisis in the territory and strengthening the ceasefire agreed upon in October, which has been repeatedly violated by the Israeli Army.
The reconstruction projects and proposals to replace the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) with a committee of Palestinian technocrats have barely advanced. Hamas has stated that it does not rule out giving up arms, but rejects doing so before said committee, which it labels as an instrument of the United States or Israel, and also demands a prior consensus among the different Palestinian factions.
The United Nations estimated last year that 70 billion dollars (about 60.4 billion euros) would be needed to rebuild the Gaza Strip after two years of offensive. That estimate would now be higher, given that the military campaign is about to reach three years and has so far caused 73,922 deaths and 174,995 injuries.