The Arab League’s Delusional Plan for Gaza

In early March, the Arab League released its plan to rehabilitate the Gaza Strip.  It is delusional and should be rejected by peace-loving nations.  The plan is essentially a well-funded yet poorly-considered real estate project, which would result in more terrorism in Israel and destruction in Gaza.  Entitled, Early Recovery, Reconstruction and Development of Gaza, the plan demonstrates Arab leaders’ continued refusal to confront the root causes of this conflict, as well as their antipathy towards Palestinian Arabs.

Really, this was a hasty and gimmicky attempt developed by Egypt and Jordan in order to dissuade the American administration from implementing President Trump’s goals of relocating Gazans and acquiring the Strip.  Since its unveiling at a press conference featuring the Secretary General of the Arab League in Cairo on March 4, the plan has been endorsed by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (comprising 57 member nations) and major European countries.  It has been rejected by Iran and the United States.

With a price tag of $53 billion and a timeline of five years, this coalition has seemingly convinced itself that it should double down on ignoring widespread Palestinian extremist ideologies, as if building “sustainable” and “prosperous green residential communities” with a view to establishing “renewable energy and strengthening trade” is even possible in Gaza. Observers of the region recall well what Gazans did with state of the art greenhouses and farming infrastructure Israelis left behind when they unilaterally withdrew from Gaza in August 2005: frenzied destruction.

The plan’s rollout also demonstrates its sponsors’ utter fear of Palestinians living within their borders.  It is as if they are obsessed in this regard. Egypt and Jordan have continued to reject any notion of respite for the two million Gazans they call “refugees,” making it clear that their borders will remain closed to the people they claim to care for.

As of this writing, Egypt currently hosts some 900,000 registered refugees and asylum seekers from 58 nations, including 147,000 from Syria.    Jordan hosts approximately 654,000 Syrian refugees.  Unlike any other refugee crisis in the world, these Palestinian refugees, however, must not be given refuge.  Doing so, according to the Arab League, would constitute “displacement” and all forms of “displacement,” “…whether within or beyond their land, under any pretext or justification” are regarded as “…acts of severe violations of international law and crimes against humanity amounting to ethnic cleansing.”

I watched the press conference in which the Secretary General of the Arab League and the man who calls himself the “Palestinian Prime Minister” tripped over themselves as they attempted to answer reporters’ most obvious questions.  What about Hamas in all this? What role will the Palestinian Authority play, if any. Other than empty word salads consisting of fancy diplomatic terms, no actual information was offered. What was made clear, however, is that even temporary relocation of Gazans in order to rebuild the territory would not be tolerated!  As far as they are concerned, their Arab brethren must continue to live in the rubble, no matter what.

Egyptians and Jordanians are most acutely afraid of housing Palestinians and therefore will not subject their people to the never-ending terrorism that accompanies them.  Money, these leaders have decided from their cushy palaces, is better expended than their own security.

Here are some key points from the plan:

1. Unfortunately, the Arab States are still clinging to the Saudi Peace Initiative of 2002, which calls for the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state based on the June 4, 1967 lines, with East Jerusalem as its capital and a return of Palestinian refugees to Israel proper.  The plan claims this – not the radicalization of the Palestinian majority or brutal dictatorships and true war criminals across the region  “…will address one of the most fundamental root causes of instability and conflict in the Middle East…”  At the end of last year, a reported 72% of Palestinians supported the October 7 terrorist attacks.  In fact, compared to pre-war polling, support for Hamas has risen “more than triple in the West Bank” since the attacks.  There are decades-long civil wars caused by terrorists in Yemen and Syria resulting in millions of deaths and injuries to innocents.  Yet the Arab League says establishing a Palestinian state will address instability in the region.  No Israeli leader in the post-October 7 milieu will even discuss this.  If the Arab League wants to “address the root causes of conflict in the region, it should remove the mass murderers running huge swaths of its territories and introduce liberal freedoms to its masses.
2. The plan calls for “…the release of hostages and detainees” in the same sentence, as if there is some equivalency to them. Israel’s choice to release the worst terrorists in its custody in return for innocent civilians should be lamented by the Arab states, not encouraged.  The scourge of Islamist terrorism displayed by Hamas is the same as Al Qaeda’s, Boko Haram’s, the Houthis’ and the Islamic State’s. Not to mention the cynical message grouping innocent civilian hostages and Palestinian prisoners conveys to Israelis and all people in the region. The fact that these leaders cannot communicate the most basic principles of humanity indicates they should not be trusted with fostering security.
3. The plan envisages a role for the Palestinian Authority in post-war Gaza.  Apparently, an “administrative committee” “working under the umbrella of the Palestinian government” will form part of the “framework for preparations for the full Return of the Palestinian National Authority to Gaza.”  The Palestinian Authority must have no role in the future.  It is an anti-Semitic dictatorship that disregards human rights and perpetuates its people’s despair in order to enrich its leaders.  This is the same group that has yet to condemn the atrocities of October 7 and continues to pay Palestinian terrorists and their families to carry out violent attacks on Israelis, branding them as martyrs.  Notwithstanding its recent commitment to end these payments, just last month, Mahmoud Abbas said they would continue even if the PA “had one penny left” clarifying he would not allow any stoppage of the payments, whatsoever.  The inclusion of the PA in the Arab states’ plan signals their disingenuousness when it comes to fostering peace and apparent disregard for the well-being of the Palestinians themselves.
4. Most alarmingly, the plan makes no mention of Hamas or Palestinian terrorism.  It simply says “the issue of multiple armed Palestinian factions remains challenging.  However, it is one that can be addressed… only if its root causes are tackled…” While these “root causes” are left undefined, they do not include Hamas’s genocidal intentions or any change to the virulent anti-Semitism and violent school curriculum in Gaza.  Just a few weeks ago, murdered Jewish children – the young Bibas brothers, whose memories should be cherished – were paraded in front of living Gazan children brandishing assault rifles and declaring their commitment to the cause of Hamas.  Arab states should be unequivocal in their condemnation of Hamas and the death cult it has fostered in Gaza.  Their failure to do so in the context of a plan to rehabilitate the Strip exemplifies their indifference to the actual root causes of the destruction there.

The Arab League’s plan for the Gaza Strip was rendered dead on Arrival in Jerusalem.  This is not surprising.  Nor is it surprising that the Muslim world (except Iran) endorsed it right away.  What is surprising is the ease with which leading European countries supported it.  Almost immediately foreign ministers from France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom declared “the plan shows a realistic path to the reconstruction of Gaza and promises [a] swift and sustainable improvement of the catastrophic living conditions [in] the Gaza Strip.”  Perhaps these nations still believe they can countenance threats against Israel.  They should be reminded, however, given the rise of Islamist extremism and terrorism in their own nations, that what starts with the Jews rarely ends with them.