Prominent Palestinians have been tapped to run Gaza under the peace plan led by US President Donald Trump. Photo / John Wessels, AFP
Prominent Palestinians from around the world have been lined up to help run Gaza after Hamas’ promised disarmament and Israel’s withdrawal, the Telegraph understands.
A senior source with detailed knowledge of the US-led preparations to stabilise Gaza said “a whole group” of candidates had been identified from Gaza and its extensive global diaspora.
They would be responsible for delivering the day-to-day running of public services until such a time as the Palestinian Authority (PA) had reformed sufficiently to take control of the enclave, they said.
Oversight would be provided by the “Board of Peace”, the external international body to be chaired by US President Donald Trump and including Sir Tony Blair, the former British Prime Minister.
Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli Prime Minister, announced a ceasefire across the shattered coastal enclave at noon local time on Friday, kickstarting the 72-hour countdown for Hamas to release the 48 hostages still held inside the territory.
Under Trump’s 20-point plan for peace, the next stage will involve the dismantling of Hamas’ military infrastructure and the demilitarisation of Gaza under the supervision of independent monitors.
Netanyahu insisted on Friday that Hamas must be disarmed – either the easy way or “the hard way” – before Israel would completely withdraw from Gaza.
In a televised address, he claimed victory for being able to secure the release of the hostages while maintaining troops inside Gaza.
“In this way, we are gripping Hamas from all sides in preparation for the next stages of the plan, in which Hamas will be disarmed and Gaza will be demilitarised,” he said. “If this is achieved the easy way, then that will be good, and if not, then it will be achieved the hard way.”
The US says Hamas and Israel have signed up to all of the 20-point plan, not just parts of it.
The plan requires Hamas to give up any role in the running of Gaza and put its weapons “beyond use”, in much the same way as the IRA was required to do under the Good Friday agreement in Northern Ireland.
In return, Israel has agreed to eventually withdraw entirely from Gaza, Hamas members who commit to peace will be given amnesty, Gaza will be rebuilt and talks on Palestinian “self-determination and statehood” will eventually restart.
With the “first phase” of the plan agreed and preparations being made for a major hostage and prisoner exchange early next week, the US and others are scrambling to put in place new security and governance for Gaza.
On Friday, it was announced that the US is sending 200 soldiers to “oversee” the ceasefire and start building a new International Stabilisation Force (ISF).
Clause 15 of Trump’s 20-point plan envisages that a US-backed but Arab-led force will “immediately deploy in Gaza” to fill the security vacuum as Israel pulls back.
The US troops are led by Admiral Brad Cooper, the head of the US military’s Central Command (Centcom). Cooper played a key role in closing the Gaza deal, with Hamas said to regard his involvement as a marker of US seriousness in forcing a permanent end to the war.
His men are expected to deploy to Egypt where they will work with military officials from Egypt, Qatar, Turkey, Jordan and the UAE – all countries that are eventually expected to provide troops for the ISF.
Egypt and Jordan will play a major role in training a separate police force for Gaza and are understood to have been training men for the role for almost two years.
“You have two elements to the security side of it,” said a source. “One will be the stabilisation force, that is credible and allows the Israelis to say, ‘Okay, we’re getting out and not leaving Hamas to revive’. And secondly, you’ll have a civil, Palestinian civil policing force, which will be run by Palestinians for Gazans.”
The source, who has close knowledge of the US plans, said governance structures for Gaza were also being prioritised.
They rejected the idea – widespread in the Arabic media – that the “Board of Peace” detailed in Trump’s 20-point plan was a “neo-colonial” construct.
Instead, they said it was a mechanism vital for securing investment from surrounding Arab states and protecting against Israeli meddling in Gaza’s new administration.
They said a UN resolution formally recognising the new ISF may be needed before all Arab states were willing to commit troops to it.
Across Gaza, thousands of Palestinians began a trek back from displacement camps in the south and centre of the Strip towards their shattered homes further north on Friday.
A huge column of displaced Gazans filed north through the dust and rubble towards Gaza City, the enclave’s biggest urban area, which had been under attack just days ago in one of Israel’s biggest offensives of the war.
“Thank God my house is still standing,” Ismail Zayda, 40, in the Sheikh Radwan district of Gaza City, told Reuters. “But the place is destroyed, my neighbours’ houses are destroyed, entire districts have gone.”
Mahdi Saqla, 40, another resident, said that despite returning to the city to find most of it destroyed, “we are happy just to return to where our homes were, even over the rubble. That too is a great joy. For two years we’ve been suffering, displaced from place to place.”
In Israel, there is huge anticipation for the release of the hostages, expected as early as Monday.
“You must understand this is the first day in two years that I can breathe and the air actually gets into my lungs,” Yael Cherni, an Israeli activist, told the Telegraph at Hostage Square in Tel Aviv. “We have been waiting to be rescued by someone. That someone is apparently Donald Trump. He is our saviour.”
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