International officials who started planning possible scenarios for Gaza after the defeat of Hamas had turned to Gulf countries, which conditioned financial aid on significant changes in the Palestinian Authority (PA) and a road map from Israel, Israel's public broadcaster Kan reported on Tuesday.
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The international effort, coordinated in part by U.S. officials, asked the Gulf States to assist financially as well as with the actual reconstruction of the Gaza Strip. The response was reportedly positive toward helping the PA if conditions were met.
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Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas meets with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Ramallah, West Bank
(Photo: AFP PHOTO / HO / PPO)
Changes in PA leadership were part of the demands from the Gulf nations, but the report did not go into the full extent of civil reforms. This follows a Washington Post op-ed by U.S. President Joe Biden, who wrote that a revitalized PA was required that would be stable and capable of controlling the Gaza Strip.
Israel would also be required to agree to what was described by Kan as “a certain type of road map, a political plan regarding the Palestinian issue.” However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been outspoken about the challenge of the PA being incapable of “accepting responsibility for the Gaza Strip.”
PA President Mahmoud Abbas “still refuses to condemn the massacre by Hamas, and his senior ministers celebrate what happened. His authority pays the murderers, and you know how they educate their children. If there is no change in this matter, what have we done?" the prime minister had stated.
It remains to be seen if the changes demanded by the Gulf States were the type that the U.S. and Israeli leaders were referring to.