Palestinian and Israeli civil society groups urge G7 to take action on Gaza

Palestinian and Israeli civil society groups meeting in Paris on Friday have urged G7 leaders to act at their summit in the French spa town of Évian-les-Bains next week to save the narrowing chances of a two-state solution.The groups called for specific action on enforcing a ceasefire, disarming Hamas and starting reconstruction in Gaza, and said the various peace processes including the Board of Peace initiative should be integrated into one programme.The Paris meeting drew up proposals from five working groups and assembled as many as 150 activists from across the Israeli-Palestinian divide.“Gaza is devastated, Israel remains under threat,” the groups said in a joint statement. “Settler violence, settlement expansion and de facto annexation and threats to the Palestinian Authority continue to undermine the viability of a future Palestinian state. Israelis and Palestinians alike remain trapped in fear, insecurity and trauma.”The groups said they feared talks over Gaza might be cast aside at the G7 summit and urged its leaders to instead “recognise the window for a solution remains open, but it is narrowing. The moment requires urgent diplomacy, grounded in partnership with civil society.”Progress on Palestinian self-rule and an Israeli exit from Gaza has been stalled for six months as each side blames the other for failing to take the steps required for peace laid down in Donald Trump’s 20-point plan. A meeting of Palestinian groups this week in Cairo made limited progress in persuading Hamas to lay down its remaining heavy weaponry to an unspecified Palestinian organisation.Hamas is demanding an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, but Israel wants Hamas to disarm first.The chance of a joint G7 statement on Gaza is described as vanishingly small.A key focus of the Paris gathering, attended by Arab and European foreign ministers including Kaja Kallas, the EU foreign policy chief, was to try to integrate the diplomatic work on a two-state solution into the civil society movements that still work together in Israel and Palestine.John Lyndon, the executive director of the Alliance for Middle East Peace, a coalition of more than 200 NGOs, said there was an openness in Israeli society to a two-state solution but this constituency was not well represented by the political parties.“Diplomacy for Israelis and Palestinians has been too elite-driven, too top-down, and increasingly removed and alien from the lived reality of Israelis and Palestinians,” he said. “There are many challenges, but one of the untapped resources is a rich, highly developed civil society that is really regionally best in class, and creative, determined and knows how to work together.”He said it was ironic that it was sometimes easier to bring such groups together in Paris under the umbrella of the French government than in Israel because of restrictions imposed by the Israeli government.The meeting in Paris came as the UK, Canada and Australia came together this week to set up a long-demanded funding stream to nurture peace groups in the region.There is deep concern that Israel, in the run-up to elections later this year, is permitting ever more settler violence on the West Bank, while the Palestinian Authority, starved of finances and democratic legitimacy, is not challenging entrenched Hamas rule in Gaza.The call to action proposes a permanent monitored ceasefire, meaningful consequences for settler violence, guaranteed humanitarian access, and the funding of reconstruction – “currently hidden from view” – undertaken via a transparent multi-year mechanism with real Palestinian ownership including civil society involvement and a clear drive to link Gaza and the West Bank. The groups in Paris have also called for Palestinian elections this year.The Paris meeting called for diplomats to ensure the Palestinian Authority was properly funded, warning that without this, the instability in the West Bank would deepen Hamas’s entrenchment in Gaza, while Israel would be left with an expanding security crisis “with no political exits”.The groups said in their statement that regional integration could be a catalyst for ending the occupation, provided it was not seen as a substitute for Palestinian statehood.