DAVOS (Reuters) – At least $15 billion would be needed to rebuild housing in the Gaza Strip, Palestine Investment Fund chairman Mohammed Mustafa said on Wednesday at the World Economic Forum, after much of the besieged enclave was flattened by Israel’s war on Hamas militants.
The Palestinian leadership would, in the short-term, continue to focus on humanitarian aid including food and water but eventually the focus would shift to reconstruction, Mustafa said.
The war has driven most of Gaza’s 2.3 million people from their homes, some of them several times, and caused a humanitarian crisis, with food, fuel and medical supplies running low.
“If the war in Gaza continues, more people are likely to die of hunger or famine than war,” Mustafa said.
The first steps should be to bring food, medicine, water and electricity back to the besieged enclave, he added.
Israel’s campaign in Gaza since the Oct. 7 Hamas assault has turned much of the Palestinian territory into a wasteland, killed more than 24,000 people and wounded nearly 61,000, health officials in the Hamas-ruled territory say.
(Reporting by Maha El Dahan; Additional reporting by Nidal Al Mughrabi; Writing by Nadine Awadalla; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, William Maclean)
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