The Gaza Strip's populations said on Saturday that they hope that the Norwegian-sponsored donors' conference, scheduled to be held in Cairo on Sunday, will gain the required political support and financial aid needed for constructing their destroyed homes.
The Gazans want to have sufficient cash for rebuilding what had been destroyed during Israel's large-scale air and ground operation launched on Gaza in July and lasted for 50 days. They expressed hope that the recommendations of the donors' conference would help them build a good infrastructure.
The populations of the impoverished coastal enclave also believe that the reconstruction process has to be accompanied by international political pressure on Israel to end eight years of an Israeli blockade and operate the crossing points either with Israel or with Egypt.
The Israeli offensive that ended in accordance to an Egyptian- brokered ceasefire agreement between Israel and Gaza Hamas-led militant groups had left large destruction in the sector of housing and infrastructure, where 2,145 Palestinians were killed and around 11,000 injured.
GOVERNMENT'S PLAN
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is chairing a high-ranking Palestinian delegation to the donors' conference in Cairo. His delegation includes Prime Minister of the unity government Rami Hamdallah, several cabinet ministers and representatives of the Palestinian private sector.
Officials said the Palestinian delegation will present during the meeting a detailed plan about the requirements of the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip within the coming five years. The Palestinian side, according to the officials, will ask for four billion U.S. dollars to finalize the plan.
Mohamed Mustafa, a deputy to Hamdallah and the minister of national economy told Xinhua that the Palestinian side is positively looking forward to see a progress in the conference and a commitment of the donors to fulfilling their financial pledges for starting the large reconstruction process in the strip.
Mustafa, who chairs the ministerial committee in the donors' conference, also said that the Israeli offensive on Gaza forced one out of four people of the populations to become displaced, adding that 35,000 houses were either completely destroyed or partially damaged.
"The most expensive part in the process of reconstruction is the housing sector. The cost for covering this sector is 1.182 billion U.S. dollars," said Mustafa, adding that "therefore, we first need temporary solutions to this problem until we will be able to rebuild the houses and renovate the damaged ones."
He noted that holding the meeting of the unity government's cabinet in the Gaza Strip on Thursday and the agreement to transfer control of the Gaza Strip crossing points to the unity government on Sunday "is a message to the donors that there is one government in order to get from them practical commitment for aid. "
RELAXING MEASURES
Experts in the field of construction in Gaza expressed hope that their participation in the debates of the conference would help carry out the latest plan agreed upon between the UN, Israel and the Palestinians on the mechanism of reconstruction.
Robert Serry, UN envoy to the Middle East, said last month that the UN reached an agreement with Israel and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) on how will be the mechanism of reconstruction in the Gaza Strip.
According to the agreement, the UN will watch and observe the process of distributing the construction raw material, mainly cements, and make sure that it will go for reconstruction and not to militant groups that they use in building up tunnels used to carry out attacks into Israel.
Nabil Abu Mu'eileq, chairman of Gaza association of contractors told Xinhua that the UN and Israeli restrictions on the entry of construction materials into Gaza "are complicated, it takes more time and the cost is so high," adding "we look forward to change the plan and find a better easy plan without restriction."
"Easing the blockade and giving more free access at the crossing points will speed up the process and those displaced people will find a house in a shorter period of time," said Abu Mu 'eileq, adding "to make the process a success, all what we need is to ease restrictions and not to make them too complicated."
The Gaza Strip is in need of one and a half million tons of cements, five million tons of construction materials in order to finalize the reconstruction plan, according to experts. The ceasefire agreement with Israel was reached after Israel expressed commitment to ease the blockade.
Hamdallah wrote in the introduction of the Palestinian plan for the reconstruction that the Gaza Strip can only survive only by lifting years of blockade and linking between the coastal enclave and the West Bank and make all the Palestinian territories open to the world.
Jamal al-Khudari, head of the committee against the Israeli blockade, said in a press statement that what the populations of the Gaza Strip are waiting for "is to lift the blockade completely, rebuild their homes, fight poverty, reduce the rates of unemployment and live a good life."