EGYPT: Donors promise almost $5 billion for Palestinians

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In a new attempt to strengthen its position as a key player in the region, Egypt today hosted an international donors conference for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the 22-day Israeli incursion that battered the seaside Palestinian enclave.

More than 70 countries and international organizations convened in the Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh and pledged $4.48 billion to rebuild Gaza. The Palestinian Authority had only requested about $3 billion. Money, however, is not the problem. Instead, the volatility of the situation in Hamas-controlled Gaza, internal divisions among Palestinians and the ascendancy of a right-wing government in Israel may jeopardize reconstruction efforts.

In their final statement, participants called for a permanent ceasefire between Hamas and Israel and reconciliation among rival Palestinians factions as ‘requisites for any successful reconstruction effort.’ Participants also stressed the need for Israel to lift its blockade for an ‘immediate, unconditional and sustained reopening’ of Israel’s crossings with Gaza.

Western donors refuse to deal with Hamas and insist that any assistance should be channeled through the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority. In this conference, donors reiterated their recognition of Mahmoud Abbas as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. Western donors threw their full support behind Abbas’ Fatah-designed plan to channel aid directly to afflicted Gazans.

‘France throws full support behind the Palestinian Authority, the prelude of a future Palestinian state. France has only one interlocutor: It is the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas,’ said French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

The U.S. has pledged $900 million as a contribution to the reconstruction efforts, to be channeled through the Palestinian Authority. “We have worked with the Palestinian Authority to install safeguards and to ensure our funding is only used where and for whom it is intended and does not end up in the wrong hands,’ Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said.

Thousands of homes and businesses were destroyed in December and January during the Israeli military attack intended to put an end to cross-border rocket attacks in southern Israel by Hamas militants.

Egypt has been trying to heal the rift between Hamas and Fatah to form an Abbas-led national unity government that could persuade Western partners to renew their engagement with the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, with the goal of a Palestinian state.

Last week, reconciliation talks started in Cairo, where Fatah and Hamas agreed to stop mutual smear campaigns in the media and to release each other’s prisoners as a goodwill gesture.

If a national unity government is formed with Hamas and Fatah, Western governments have been called upon not to boycott the new government. ‘We expect the international community to deal with that government as one formed by the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas,’ Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit told reporters.

“There must be a distinction between a Palestinian national unity government and viewpoints vis-à-vis Palestinian organizations that exist on the ground.”

The Europeans seem flexible on this point. Benita Ferrero-Waldner, EU commissioner for external relations and neighborhood policy, spoke to reporters at the conference about how the EU would deal with a national unity government that included Hamas. “We have always said that we are in favor of reconciliation behind President Mahoumd Abbas,” she said.

According to an Egyptian official speaking on condition of anonymity, the availability of funds may spur Hamas to reconcile with Fatah to speed money to the Islamist group’s suffering constituency in the Gaza Strip.

—Noha El-Hennawy in Sharm el Sheik
(Updated: An earlier post said El-Hennawy was in Cairo.)