Three years after the Cairo conference on rebuilding Gaza: funding promises, the UN mechanism, and the suffering that remains

– Omar Shaban
Pal-Think for Strategic Studies
Gaza, Palestine

Today, the 12th of October, is the third anniversary of the donors' conference for the reconstruction of Gaza held in Cairo in 2014. For 51 days, in the summer of 2014, the Gaza Strip saw the most violent assault since the beginning of the Israeli occupation in 1967, causing the worst humanitarian, economic,
and social catastrophe of all in decades. Shortly after the war, on 12 October 2014, the conference for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip convened in the Egyptian capital Cairo, under Egyptian–Norwegian sponsorship, and the donors pledged a sum of 5.4 billion dollars. According to many credible
international and local reports, the process of rebuilding what the three wars the Gaza Strip suffered in the past years destroyed is very slow and in no way keeps pace with the scale of the destruction and the challenges. The reconstruction process is not only slow but marred by
many suspicions of corruption, mismanagement, and the noticeable waste of the donors' funds, which are scarce to begin with.

Introduction:

Shortly before the latest Israeli war on the Gaza Strip laid down its burdens, and before its deadly clamour quieted, I wrote: “The war's end may reveal a reality more painful than the war itself”. I feared I would be right. Today, three years after the Cairo conference
for the reconstruction of Gaza, held in Cairo on 12 October 2014, in which the donor states pledged to pay donations of 5.4 billion, half of it set aside for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip — and with the United Nations putting itself forward as an intermediary to monitor the raw materials and how
they are used, the announcement of the United Nations reconstruction mechanism, the raising of dozens of press reports and the multiple meetings — one may say the mountain of conferences and reports laboured and gave birth to a reconstruction process moving at a tortoise's pace. 7,000 families who lost their homes still live in places other than their homes, in addition to hundreds of factories, farms, and infrastructure — which raises questions and doubts about the donors' promises, the good intentions, and the outward solidarity. The reconstruction process is not only slow but marred by many suspicions of corruption, mismanagement, and the noticeable waste of the donors' funds, which are scarce to begin with.

The Gaza Strip: the triangle of terror: blockade, division, and wars:

The small, densely populated Gaza Strip has been subject to a severe blockade since June 2007, under which the entry of thousands of goods was barred and the population's movement from it restricted — accompanied by three bloody wars, 2008–2009, 2012, 2014 — leading to accumulated and complex humanitarian crises: more than 80% of its population came to rely on humanitarian aid; unemployment reached, by force of the blockade years, some 42.8%, compared with 17.4% in the West Bank; and the Israeli blockade led to barring the entry of most raw materials to the Gaza Strip, causing the halt of about 90% of the projects the industrial establishments used to run, and the loss by more than 75 thousand employees — providing for about half a million people — of their jobs since 2007.

In the period between 7 July and 27 August 2014, the Gaza Strip saw a bloody war between Israel and the armed Palestinian organisations in the Gaza Strip, called by Israel operation “Protective Edge”. Human losses in the Palestinians' ranks totalled 2,220, among them 1,492 civilians (551 children, 299 women); it likewise led to the destruction of 17,132 homes, of which 2,465 homes were destroyed entirely and 14,667 homes destroyed partially, in addition to 39,500 homes that suffered damage. The Israeli attacks likewise caused the destruction of 171 mosques, 62 of them destroyed entirely and 109 partially. The following table shows the number of housing units demolished/damaged by the three latest wars:

Military operations	(housing units) entirely demolished	(housing units) grave, severe damage	(housing units) suffered damage
2014 – Protective Edge	2,465	14,667	39,500
2012 – Pillar of Cloud	184	198	10,000
(2008-2009) Cast Lead	3,425	2,843	54,800

After several rounds of negotiations between the Israeli government and the Palestinian National Authority with the participation of delegates of the Hamas and Islamic Jihad movements, these rounds yielded the two delegations' agreement to a ceasefire according to the Egyptian paper on which several amendments were made
. Under the agreement the two parties commit to an immediate, lasting, and long ceasefire, the two parties pledge to halt any hostile acts, and a full opening of the crossings with coordination between the Palestinian Authority and Israel on its working mechanism, without any restrictions on goods,
and the entry of goods according to need. The agreement likewise comprised the gradual evacuation of the buffer zone, with the Palestinians allowed to use it at once; it kept the gradual widening of the sea-fishing area from 6 miles to 12; with a return after a month to discuss the matters of the port and the airport and the matter of the bodies of the Israeli soldiers believed to be held by the Palestinian organisations.

The Cairo conference for the Strip's reconstruction (the resolutions)

On 12 October 2014, the conference for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip convened in the Egyptian capital Cairo, under Egyptian–Norwegian sponsorship. More than 50 states and 20 regional and international organisations took part in the conference, with the aim of strengthening the Palestinian government's capacity to bear its responsibility
for the rehabilitation of the Gaza Strip, in addition to providing the financial support for the Strip's reconstruction. The donor states pledged during the conference to offer 5.4 billion dollars, half of it set aside for the Strip's reconstruction efforts. The conference's presidency tied the offering of international financial support
to three conditions: the national-consensus government extending its control over the Strip; the aid not being used for purposes other than those set for it; and working to open the border crossings between Israel and the Gaza Strip. Striking is that the donors' conference came under the Palestinian national-consensus government — the first national-consensus government since the political division of 2007, formed on 2 June 2014 after consultations with all the Palestinian factions. The conference's closing statement set out the urgent need for 414 million dollars for humanitarian relief, then 2.1 billion dollars for the economy's recovery in the first stage, in addition to 4.2 billion dollars, the initial cost of reconstruction. The donor states announced their approval of the national-consensus government's plan concerning reconstruction, and the necessity that this be accompanied
by support for its own budget for development in the West Bank.

The United Nations reconstruction mechanism – complicated procedures and endless waiting

On 16 September 2014, Mr Robert Serry, the former United Nations special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, announced the United Nations mechanism for the reconstruction of Gaza, and made clear that the United Nations, Israel, and the Palestinian Authority had reached an agreement allowing work to begin on the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip, with international oversight of the materials' use, with the private sector's participation, and with the Palestinian Authority given a leading role in the reconstruction efforts. Mr Serry revealed that the agreement offers the security guarantees through a mechanism of oversight of the materials, to make sure of their use entirely for civilian purposes. He pointed out that the temporary reconstruction mechanism is an important step giving hope to the Palestinian people in Gaza, and hoped Israel would lift the closures for the remaining areas in Gaza.

This agreement offers the security guarantees to Israel through a mechanism of oversight of the building materials entered into the Gaza Strip, to make sure of their use entirely for building purposes only. But the United Nations was swinging between the need to lighten the hardship of the humanitarian conditions and how to offer security guarantees to Israel. The plan aims to distribute dozens of international monitors in the Gaza Strip, to monitor the fundamental reconstruction areas, such as the residential neighbourhoods or the large public buildings; these monitors would be distributed at
“the storage sites of building materials such as cement, concrete, and the dual-use materials, such as metal pipes or iron bars, and likewise at the sites of “the parking of bulldozers and other heavy mechanical equipment”. The international monitors' task is to guarantee that
the building materials and heavy mechanical equipment are used for rebuilding Gaza only, and not by the Hamas movement for digging tunnels and building underground shelters. The plan Mr Serry offered for the reconstruction of Gaza rests on easing the entry of all reconstruction
materials, and the mechanism comprises oversight according to a computerised system supervising the entry and use of all the materials needed for the Strip's reconstruction. According to senior Palestinian officials, the Authority accepted the plan because it contributes to speeding the reconstruction and offers guarantees to the donor
states concerning this process, in addition to encouraging them to offer the aid needed for reconstruction at the coming conference; at the same time they demanded the lifting of the blockade entirely from the Gaza Strip.

The available data point to the entry of building materials proceeding through three channels:

1- Following the entry of the materials set aside for the projects in the Strip, and storing them in special stores under guard around the clock, with surveillance cameras supervised by Israel.

2- Entering the materials for the benefit of rebuilding the demolished homes, through known contractors, and after presenting detailed statements of the quantities and places; Egypt and Israel bar the entry of iron pipes, replaced with plastic pipes.

3- Forming a special crew of experts and engineers, with the aim of examining the dual-use materials and preventing their reaching the Strip

The details of the United Nations reconstruction mechanism

The mechanism of approving the rebuilding of any destroyed building requires the affected person raising a request file, through the ministry of civil affairs, to the competent committee agreed between His Excellency the prime minister and the Civil Administration in November 2014 — such that any request is presented
to this committee, formed of delegates of (the prime minister's office, the ministry of civil affairs, the Israeli Civil Administration, and the United Nations Office for Project Services). This committee studies the requests for rebuilding the destroyed buildings or erecting new buildings, such that they comprise all the required data, and these requests pass through the following mechanism:

1. Receiving the requests complete in all the required information: the beneficiary's name — the contractor's name — the coordinates of the building site — the coordinates of the contracting company — the project manager — the identity and mobile numbers of all the principal workers on the project — a statement showing the quantities of materials needed for rebuilding — another statement defining the dual-use materials — the number of implementation stages ………. etc., and the project is set for study by the committee's members.

2. After receiving the requests and their fulfilment of all the required information, they are entered and uploaded on the dedicated website for study by the competent committee: Uploading of Information Underway

3. After the project's entry on the site it is set for examination: Under Consideration

4. After that the project or building is given, should the file's completion be approved, an initial approval: Approved in principle.

5. The committee re-examines the project in its final state, whereupon the approval is confirmed: Fully confirmed — and then the project or building has been approved, and the owner of the project or of the building to be rebuilt, or of a new building to be erected, is given the approval
to buy the building materials needed for rebuilding the building or the project from the accredited merchants.

6. The citizen informs the United Nations Office for Project Services UNOPS that they are ready for implementation and the purchase of materials — everyone having been notified, through a dedicated website, grm.report, of the stages the project has passed through.

7. A delegate of the United Nations Office for Project Services UNOPS visits the site, surveys the equipment for the process of monitoring the rebuilding, gives approval for the rebuilding, and gives their instructions through the GRM site that the project has become Active
— and only then does the project's owner have the right to buy building materials under the statement presented in advance, and according to the work stages approved, through the building-materials merchants accredited by the Israeli side.

8. At the actual start of the rebuilding begins the process of monitoring the consumption of building materials within a special electronic programme supervised by the United Nations office previously mentioned in clause (6), to make sure the building materials are used for rebuilding the project or the building only…. In
most cases a monitor from the United Nations office is appointed at the project site to raise daily reports in order to guarantee no leakage of cement or building materials to other places or purposes!!

An assessment of the United Nations mechanism for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip:

The United Nations mechanism for the oversight of the Gaza Strip's reconstruction faced many strong criticisms from multiple parties: it was described as a political agreement granting the blockade international cover, and that the United Nations substitutes for the Israeli occupation's role in besieging the Gaza Strip — going beyond being a mechanism for entering reconstruction materials. Likewise that it deepened the suffering of the civilian population, especially the owners of the destroyed homes, since it stipulates knowing the affected and the party benefiting from the cement and defines the distributors on security grounds — over and above that there are merchants barred on security grounds from receiving and distributing cement. The Strip's population were waiting for the United Nations to perform its role in supporting the needs of the Strip's reconstruction without obstacles, instead of monitoring the entry of building materials. This mechanism impedes and obstructs the reconstruction efforts, particularly as it reaches strategic reconstruction projects required in different areas of the Gaza Strip — over and above that it did not take into account the housing needs in the Strip for the period before the latest war. The British newspaper “The Guardian” published a report on the causes of the delay in the Strip's reconstruction, which go back to many causes, among them the “Israeli” blockade and the mechanism followed according to the plan of the United Nations envoy Mr “Robert Serry” — which the newspaper considered may form a window for the spread of corruption and bribery among the influential figures responsible for delivering the reconstruction materials. For its part, the charitable institution “Oxfam” published a report stating that despite the pledges to pay a sum of 5.4 billion American dollars during the donors' conference, and the reaching of an agreement between the Palestinian Authority, “Israel”, and the United Nations to allow the entry of building materials to the Gaza Strip, only small quantities of building materials were entered. “Oxfam” observes that even if the mechanism were employed fully, this would not be sufficient to meet the immense needs of the population in Gaza; and the institution urged the donor bodies and the international community not to allow the reconstruction mechanism to be a substitute for putting an end to the blockade,

The author of this paper, and many civil-society organisations and the private sector, strongly criticised this mechanism upon its announcement. The centre considered the mechanism an institutionalisation of the blockade and international cover for it, and likewise considered it as working to internationalise the blockade and transform the United
Nations from a guardian of peoples' rights into an international contracting and guarding company of exorbitant cost. It likewise believes this mechanism will deepen the suffering of the civilian population, especially the owners of the destroyed homes, and will not contribute to reconstruction.
And given that the mechanism achieved no actual results on the ground and deepened the humanitarian conditions in the Strip, some states set about withdrawing from the agreement: Qatar withdrew from this agreement — noting that it had earmarked 250 million dollars at the donors' conference
in Cairo for the reconstruction projects in Gaza. The United Nations mechanism contributed to deepening the state of anger and frustration among different sections of the people and the political parties, and the people directed their anger and indignation in the face of the United Nations: on a visit by Robert Serry to the Strip on 11 December 2014 he was confronted by a group of indignant youth and people who had become homeless, driving him to leave the Strip at once.

• Many citizens who received their shares of building materials complained that the quantity of cement set aside for them does not meet their real needs and does not suffice to repair their homes — forcing many of them to sell the limited quantity they received on the black market for their need of cash liquidity and the insufficiency of building materials; these materials are resold again to other needy people at prices multiplied several times. The remaining other segments were excluded, including the owners of homes and other civilian establishments entirely destroyed, while private construction projects were not included in the mechanism at all. On the other side, the merchants and building-materials companies face many problems, beginning with the security screening and the Israeli approval, the strict oversight of the cement-distribution centres, and the closure of cement-sale distribution centres,
• The clash of roles among the multiple parties led to the waste of human energies and the donors' funds and the delay of the reconstruction process — this was clear in the two previous wars. Reconstruction would have represented a historic opportunity to empower the National Authority in the Gaza Strip and lay down a process of consultation between the donors and the Palestinian Authority on one side, and the Palestinian organisations, especially Hamas and Islamic Jihad, on the other — to manage the reconstruction process with transparency and credibility and according to a defined timetable.
• The way currently followed makes the possibility of a new round of fighting breaking out at any moment an expected matter, given the failure this mechanism has left behind for the Strip's reconstruction, and the deepening of the humanitarian crises and the deterioration of economic and social conditions that resulted from it — which may make Gaza fertile ground for the spread of extremism and chaos in Gazan society.

The reconstruction process… the lost opportunity:

It has been proven by evidence that the United Nations mechanism failed to face the post-war challenges; it legitimised the blockade on the Gaza Strip. The reconstruction of the Gaza Strip was a historic opportunity that should have been seized by all the spectra of the Palestinian political colour, through the effective
and full participation of the Palestinian National Authority and the political forces, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and civil-society organisations. Actual results could have been achieved in both directions: the first, reconstruction would be an opportunity to carry out a comprehensive national plan going beyond the economic and housing dimension of building what was destroyed and compensating the affected, to comprise all the political and social dimensions, including achieving reconciliation and national unity; the second, the reconstruction process could be a means of strengthening and building trust between
the Israelis and the Palestinians, to begin immediate serious negotiations and reach a long-term calm, were this means employed in the Strip's reconstruction.

For the reconstruction process to be serious and national, a higher council for reconstruction should have been formed comprising representatives of the Palestinian institutions (Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and civil society), representatives of the affected, the private sector, and representatives of regional states and the United Nations agencies, to supervise the Strip's reconstruction process — responsible for easing the reconstruction process and monitoring the building materials to curb Israel's fears that this easing lead to the rearmament of the Hamas and Islamic Jihad movements, giving the guarantees to Israel on this side. This council would guarantee the distribution of reconstruction's benefits fairly among the Strip's population, resting on the principle of standing needs not political affiliation, and the demand to complete the implementation of the country-level projects and preserve the flow of building materials' entry through the Rafah land crossing, because of the inability of the Kerem Shalom crossing to meet the requirements of rebuilding the destruction.

In addition to that, at the local level, the reconstruction process must be fair, and this requires not allowing a single company to monopolise the distribution of building materials, and allowing all merchants to compete in buying building materials according to their financial and administrative capacity.
The donors must fulfil their financial commitments according to what was announced at the Cairo conference, with warning against repeating the scenario of the Sharm el-Sheikh conference — that is in the interest of all parties. And finally, the international community must lay down sufficient guarantees that what is rebuilt
will not be destroyed.