RAMALLAH // Israel has ruled out allowing a quick and substantial increase in desperately needed construction material into Gaza, despite a deal reached this week, Palestinian and UN officials said.
The deal announced by the UN Middle East envoy Robert Serry at a UN Security Council meeting on Tuesday allows private companies to take part in rebuilding the devastated coastal territory. It also provides for monitoring of the supply of construction materials to exclude dual-purpose materials that could be used against Israel.
According to the Palestinian Authority, which was instrumental in brokering the deal and will be involved in the reconstruction effort, the cost of rebuilding 18,000 homes razed by Israeli bombardment alone will be US$2.5 billion (Dh9.2bn).
As well as homes, the Israeli shelling and bombing destroyed the territory’s only power plant and other infrastructure, as well businesses and mosques during 50 days of fighting with Gaza-based militants.
The cost of rebuilding will be about $7.8bn, the Palestinian Economic Council for Research and Development said after a survey.
The council head, Mohammed Shtayyeh, an economist and senior member of the West Bank's dominant PA-affiliated Fatah party, told The National the Israelis would allow cement and steel into Gaza.
Both items are on Israel’s “dual-purpose” list and their import prohibited as part of an eight-year blockade imposed after the Islamist Hamas movement took control of the territory.
“Without those no reconstruction can take place,” said Mr Shtayyeh, who is an adviser to the PA on rebuilding Gaza. “However, the Israelis say they will only allow 350 trucks with construction material and other goods into Gaza per day.”
“In 2005, before the wars, which decimated Gaza’s infrastructure, there were over 600 trucks entering Gaza on a daily basis, so the Israelis are only partially lifting the siege,” he said.
“This is not what we want. We want the complete lifting of the siege as soon as possible. Winter is coming and tens of thousands of people remain homeless.”
Mr Shtayyeh said the Israelis would only allow the entry of construction materials once the UN mechanism for monitoring what goods were entering was verified.
“They say they will try to do this as quickly as possible.”
The deputy UN Middle East envoy, James Rawley, said Israel’s defence minister Moshe Yaalon had said only 350 lorries of goods would be allowed into Gaza per day – and only after several months, on condition of the ceasefire holding and successful implementation of the UN’s monitoring mechanism.
“However, we hope that down the road when the monitoring mechanism goes into effect fully, 600-800 truckloads of construction material will be able to enter Gaza per day – a jump from the 200 or so trucks that enter now. Anything less than 600 trucks a day will be insufficient to rebuild Gaza,” Mr Rawley said.
“We have to go step by step and ensure that Israel’s legitimate security concerns are being addressed. We are currently establishing a database which will track goods from when they leave Israel to when they arrive in Gaza.
“The flow of goods into Gaza will facilitate recovery and reconstruction and we’re hoping that this step in the right direction will set the stage for an even more meaningful opening of the crossings,” Mr Rawley said.
This year’s Gaza war was the deadliest and most destructive assault against the enclave since 1967.
“The devastation caused this time is unprecedented in recent memory,” said Chris Gunness, spokesman for the UN Relief and Works Agency.
“Parts of Gaza resemble an earthquake zone with 29 kilometres of damaged infrastructure.”
Four of Gaza’s 32 hospitals and five of its 97 primary health clinics have been forced to close because of damage from the Israeli bombing. Another 17 hospitals and 45 clinics have been severely damaged.
Twenty-two schools have been destroyed and 118 were damaged, along with many higher education facilities. Eighty-one mosques were destroyed and 150 damaged.
Unrwa said that approximately 110,000 Gazans remain in UN emergency shelters or with host families. Of Unrwa’s 250 Gaza facilities, 103 were damaged.
According to the Palestinian Federation of Industries, 129 businesses or workshops were completely destroyed and 419 damaged.
“We have 300 engineers surveying 40,000 [damaged and destroyed] homes over the next few months. But there is no point in building homes if they are not connected to sewage and water infrastructure,” Mr Gunness said.
Roads, electricity lines and water and sanitation networks are also in need of repair, adding to the massive cost of returning the lives of Gazans to normality.
To raise funds, Cairo will host a donor conference on Gaza reconstruction on October 12, while donor nations to the PA are to convene on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly next week.
However, after three wars since 2008, the success of this conference and the implementation of a reconstruction programme will depend largely on a lasting ceasefire between Hamas and Israel.
“Taxpayers are being asked to fund Gaza’s reconstruction yet again with no security guarantees and with each new war more bitterness is created, so a resolution is essential,” Mr Gunness said.
Mr Serry, the UN envoy, warned the Security Council of further dangers and a downwards spiral if the dynamics in Gaza did not change and if the occupation and the conflict continued.
“When I warn that Gaza could implode or explode again I’m not crying wolf. The council should not underestimate the dangers.”
foreign.desk@thenational.ae
