Turkiye set to call for action on Gaza as soon as possible: Report
Turkiye’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan is expected to call at a meeting in Istanbul on Monday for arrangements to be made as soon as possible to ensure the security and administration of Gaza by Palestinians, according to the Reuters news agency, quoting a source from the ministry.
Foreign ministers of Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Jordan, Pakistan and Indonesia are set to join the meeting on ceasefire developments and the humanitarian situation in Gaza, Reuters quoted the source as saying.
Fidan was expected to “emphasise the importance of coordinated action by Muslim countries for the ceasefire to evolve into a lasting peace”, it added.
Erdogan slams Israel’s ‘poor’ ceasefire record as more than 200 killed since agreement
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says Hamas appears more determined than Israel to comply with the ceasefire in Gaza.
“We all see that Israel’s record on this matter is very poor,” Erdogan said in remarks carried by the Turkish state-run Anadolu news agency. “We are facing an administration that has massacred over 200 innocent people since the ceasefire agreement and continues its occupation and attacks on the West Bank,” he said.
“We cannot allow the annexation of the West Bank, the changing of Jerusalem’s status or attempts to damage the sanctity of the Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
The many unanswered questions over Gaza’s international stabilisation force
Trump’s 20-point ceasefire plan provides for the deployment of an International Stabilisation Force (ISF) inside Gaza tasked with security guarantees.
But there is little information on what this force looks like, with many unanswered questions around it, says Adel Abdel Ghafar, a senior fellow and director of the foreign policy and security programme at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs.
“It is supposed to act as a bridge from conflict to stabilisation to reconstruction. It is supposed to protect Gaza’s borders as Israel withdraws; to alleviate Israel’s fears over the re-militarisation of Gaza; to provide training to ‘vetted’ Palestinian security forces and signal to Palestinians that this is not occupation but that many Muslim countries are involved,” Ghafar said.
Yet, there are multiple challenges for the implementation, and questions that need to be clearly answered before countries commit to joining it, he said, such as:
- Is there a UN mandate to join this force?
- Who is going to command this force?
- What are the rules of engagement?
- Which Palestinian forces are you going to train?
- The ISF is supposed to deploy in Gaza once Hamas disarms – how is that going to happen?
The initial phase of the ceasefire pushed these questions away, but “now it’s time to answer them,” he said.
