Palestinians in a neighborhood devastated by Israeli strikes in the southern Gaza Strip, Dec. 2, 2024. (Credit: Bachar Taleb/AFP)
According to the Israeli daily Haaretz and some Arab media, Hamas and Fatah have agreed to form a joint committee to administer the Gaza Strip, following a proposal sponsored by Egypt. The agreement was reached in Cairo between the two parties, following talks which ended on Monday. The official Iranian news agency IRNA also published the information and some details of the agreement.
According to the document, the committee will manage the distribution of humanitarian aid, oversee Gaza's civil administration and coordinate reconstruction efforts. It will also supervise the Rafah border crossing with Egypt, in line with the agreement reached in 2005.
The Iranian agency specified that the committee, which will be made up of 10 to 15 people, will be supervised by the Palestinian Authority, and that Gaza will not be cut off from the other Palestinian territories in the future. Haaretz points out that some of the committee members will be chosen from among independent Palestinian experts.
As part of this agreement, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will have to issue a decree ordering the creation of the Community Support Committee, which will be subordinate to the Palestinian government for administrative, financial, supervisory and legal matters, Haaretz continues, to which a senior Palestinian official said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government are still opposed to any Palestinian Authority involvement in the Gaza Strip.
Talks between Fatah and Hamas have been ongoing since Sunday, and the announcement of this agreement comes just hours after U.S. President-elect Donald Trump made a threat on X, promising “hell” in the Middle East if the hostages held in the Palestinian enclave were not released before his inauguration on Jan. 20.
Last Saturday, Hamas broadcast a video showing a young Israeli-American hostage being held in the Gaza tunnels.
The war in this territory was triggered on Oct. 7, 2023 by an unprecedented Hamas offensive, which left 1,200 people dead. During the attack, 251 people were kidnapped on Israeli soil. A total of 97 remain hostages in Gaza, 34 of whom have been declared dead by the Israeli army, some of them having been killed in Israel's massive bombardment of the Palestinian enclave, which has been under siege for years. These bombardments have also killed almost 45,000 Palestinians in 14 months, according to Gaza's Health Ministry figures. Some voices in Israel, such as the far-right Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir, openly call for the colonization of Gaza and the definitive departure of the Palestinians.