Gaza's first day of Ramadan amidst the rubble of a residential area in Rafah, Gaza (Photo by Ali Jadallah/Anadolu)
Arab foreign ministers met in Cairo on Monday, March 3, for talks focusing on Egypt’s plan to rebuild the war-ravaged Gaza Strip.
On February 18, Egypt announced that it is developing a plan to rebuild Gaza without forcing Palestinians out of the strip in a counter to President Donald Trump’s proposal to depopulate the territory so the U.S. can take it over.
Egypt’s state-run Al-Ahram newspaper said the proposal calls for establishing “secure areas” within Gaza where Palestinians can live initially while Egyptian and international construction firms remove and rehabilitate the strip’s infrastructure.
Egyptian officials have been discussing the plan with European diplomats as well as with Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, according to two Egyptian officials and Arab and Western diplomats. They are also discussing ways to fund the reconstruction, including an international conference on Gaza reconstruction, said one of the Egyptian officials and an Arab diplomat.
The proposal comes after an international uproar over Trump’s call for the removal of Gaza’s population of some 2 million Palestinians. Trump said the United States would take over the Gaza Strip and rebuild it into a “Riviera of the Middle East,” though Palestinians would not be allowed back.
Meanwhile, mediators Egypt and Qatar accused Israel of violating humanitarian law by using starvation as a weapon against the Palestinians in Gaza.
This post was last modified on March 4, 2025 2:24 pm