US President Donald Trump's Board of Peace has approved a pilot project to house Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, abandoning, at least for now, its initial plans for the reconstruction of the war-devastated territory.
Sources briefed on the board's decision, adopted at a meeting in Cyprus this month, said the new plan envisages the construction of a camp for Palestinians near the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
Security at the facility, which the sources said could house up to 50,000 people, will be provided by Palestinian police vetted by Israel. A small contingent of the UN-sanctioned International Stabilisation Force will also be deployed.
The plan, said the sources, is not expected to take shape until later this year, most likely after Israel's general election in October.
The reconstruction of Gaza is part of President Trump's 20-point plan, which included a ceasefire that went into force in October, pausing two years of war between Israel and Hamas that killed more than 70,000 Palestinians and destroyed the strip's infrastructure and reduced swathes of the territory to rubble. The conflict has also displaced most of Gaza's 2.3 million residents.
Israel has repeatedly violated the October ceasefire, killing more than 1,000 Palestinians since it came into force. Its military has also significantly advanced beyond the “yellow line” that marked the area under its control.
Moreover, Israel has prevented any reconstruction work from taking place and severely limited the flow of humanitarian aid into the territory. It has also denied the entry into Gaza of a commission of Palestinian technocrats mandated under the Trump plan to run the territory's day-to-day affairs. Israel has said they could only come to Gaza after Hamas surrenders its weapons, including firearms held for personal protection.
The pilot project, according to an initial report by The Guardian last week, would consist of portable cabins for displaced people set up in the buffer zone along the ceasefire line near Rafah.
Israeli troops would withdraw from the line and security at the crossing between Hamas-run Gaza. The camp would be overseen by the International Stabilisation Force and Israeli-vetted Palestinian police.
“The project is seemingly part of Israel's plan not to withdraw from Gaza, to create security zones in areas of Gaza abutting its border along with heavily controlled camps for displaced Palestinians,” said one of the sources.
“The end game appears to be the creation of conditions so difficult and degrading for the Palestinians while discreetly encouraging them to leave.
“It's like 1948 again,” said the source, alluding to the creation of the state of Israel and the displacement of about 700,000 Palestinians in what became known as the Nakba, the Arabic word for catastrophe.
Besides Israel's perceived intransigence, the Trump plan appears to have stalled since the outbreak of the Iran war, which initially involved the US and Israel but which Washington is now fighting alone.
The US administration has also been distracted by the possible loss of Mr Trump's Republican party's majority in Congress at the midterm elections later this year.
Although it is unlikely to take shape for several months, the pilot project deals a serious blow to the efforts of mediators Egypt, Qatar and Turkey. Their negotiators have been striving to win concessions from Hamas on the thorny issue of disarmament to satisfy Israel and move forward with the implementation of the Trump plan.
However, the sources contended, the mediators, while opposed to the pilot project as a significant deviation from the Trump plan's provisions, have reluctantly gone along with the Board of Peace decision because of the situation created by Israel on the ground.
“It is not the end of the mediators' efforts or aspirations to get the Palestinians in Gaza a good deal, but the pilot project is a major setback,” said another source.
