LAST week, in response to President Trump’s unilateral Gaza’s occupation plan, the 57-member Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) adopted a multilateral reconstruction plan in Gaza, which was earlier ratified by the Arab League Summit in Cairo.
France, Germany, Italy (the EU member states) and the UK have supported this plan.
In juxtaposition of Trump’s so-called Gazariviera plan, which is in contravention of international law, the OIC-supported plan strongly upholds the writ of international law as unlike the Trump’s plan of forced displacement of .2.4 million Gazans, the OIC’s multilateral plan aims to rebuild Gaza without any displacement of its inhabitants.
Obviously there has been a brewing disagreement between the US, the Arab nations and the EU member states regarding a post-war reconstruction plan for Gaza.
Consequent upon the Arab leaders’ agreement made in the Cairo Summit (March 04) regarding the Egyptian proposal of Gaza ‘s reconstruction costing $ 53 billion and avoiding relocation of the 2.4 million Palestinians, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) adopted an Arab counter-plan to address the situation in Gaza during an emergency meeting held in Jeddah (March 07), Saudi Arabia.
This plan envisions an independent committee of technocrats running Gaza for six months before transferring control.
According to the OIC’s FMs moot, The OIC “adopts the plan… on the early recovery and reconstruction of Gaza”, the Islamic bloc said in a statement.
It urged “the international community and international and regional funding institutions to swiftly provide the necessary support’ ’The emergency ministerial meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation adopted the Egyptian plan, which has now become an Arab-Islamic plan,” Egyptian Foreign Minister BadrAbdelatty said, The next step is for the plan to become an international plan through adoption by the European Union and international parties such as Japan, Russia, China and others,”Abdelatty said.
Moreover, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar emphasized that the OIC must collectively oppose and block any attempt to relocate Palestinians from their homeland, whether through direct coercion or under the guise of humanitarian relief and reconstruction.
Pak deputy prime minister further urged the OIC to recognize the notion of Palestinian displacement as a “red line’’ as any such move constitutes ethnic cleansing and a grave violation of international law.
He also stressed restoring the UNRWA‘s role towards the Palestinian rehabilitation while pointing that the Palestinians must receive expanded and unhindered humanitarian assistance as Israel had a legal duty under Article 2 (5) of the UN Charter to facilitate its work.
Fundamentally, the OIC-endorsed plan aims to reconstruct a devastated Gaza while maintaining peace and security through a revitalized role of the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the territory.
As per the plan, the reconstruction of Gaza undergoes three phases over five years, with temporary housing for displaced Gazans while segments of the enclave are rebuilt sequentially.
Several nations, including France, Italy, Germany and the UK, have proposed a $53 billion plan, which they believe offers a “realistic” path to reconstruction.
The OIC’s Gaza reconstruction plan includes seven areas to accommodate over 1.5 million people, aiming to build at least 400,000 permanent homes and rebuilding the seaport and international airport.
The plan also incorporates automation in administration and financial planning and includes training programs.
In the first phase, which would last six months and cost $3bn, millions of tonnes of rubble and any unexploded ordnance would be cleared.
The second phase, lasting two years and costing $20bn, would see housing and utilities rebuilt.
An airport, two seaports and an industrial zone would be built during the third phase, which would take another two years and cost $30bn.
The Arab plan also proposes that an “administrative committee” made up of independent Palestinian technocrats run post-war Gaza for a transitional period while “working towards empowering the Palestinian Authority to return.
By 2030, the OIC-crafted plan foresees hundreds of thousands of new homes housing up to 3 million people as well as an airport, industrial zones, hotels and parks.
Under the proposal, Gaza would be governed by a reformed Palestinian Authority.
The Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas have called for Gaza to be governed temporarily by a committee of independent experts and for international peacekeepers to be deployed there.
Yet, both the US and Israel have rejected the OIC‘s supported Gaza reconstruction initiative, a paragon model of multilateral forces resisting the US-Israel’s agenda of Gaza’s occupation.
Needless to say, the Palestinians’ right of self-determination envisaging the compliance of international law via implementing a two state solution, is the only antithesis of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Despite the US-Israel reluctance to accept the Arab plan, Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, later downplayed the Trump administration’s concerns, describing the plan as ‘a good faith first step from the Egyptians’.
Hopefully, the international community will soon recognize the OIC‘s chartered plan as a credible roadmap to resolve the lingering Gaza crisis.
Thus, Cairo must nonetheless harness its efforts to form a broad working group, including Egypt, Jordan, the US, the Palestinian Authority, the Gulf States, the EU and other donors.
Amid the growing need of the Palestinian unity regarding the proposed plan, a coordinated US–Arab effort should also ‘’prepare the ground for the launch of peace negotiations’’ between the Palestinian Authority and Israel, thereby reaching an agreement on a long-term truce between Israel and Hamas, following the ceasefire, to give the peace diplomacy a chance to succeed.
—The writer, based in Pakistan, an independent IR & International Law analyst, also an expert in Conflict and Peace Studies (with special focus on Palestine, Kashmir), is member of European Consortium of Political Research (ECPR), including the Washington Foreign Law Society/American Society of International Law. (rizvipeaceresearcher@gmail.com)
