Rebuilding Gaza to cost $71bn, must include Palestinians, report finds

Rebuilding the enclave will cost seven times the combined cost of all past offensives, report says.Rebuilding Gaza will cost seven times more than all previous rebuilding efforts in Gaza combined in the last two decades, according to a new joint Oxfam report.The devastation from more than two years of war has killed at least 73,000 Palestinians, injured 173,000 and displaced 1.9 million. It has left the Gaza Strip needing an estimated $71.4bn to recover, according to the UN-EU-World Bank Rapid Damage and Needs Assessment (RDNA) released in April.Human development has been set back by 77 years according to the new report by Oxfam, the Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute (MAS) and the Palestine Trade Centre (PalTrade), which asserts that the rebuilding of Gaza cannot move forward without direct Palestinian involvement.“Reconstruction is not only a humanitarian task; it is a political one. A plan designed in foreign capitals, however well-funded, would be a cosmetic exercise – simply another form of control over Palestinian land and lives. Our consultations across Gaza carried one unmistakable message: nothing about our future without us,” Misyef Jamil, senior researcher at MAS, said.How much will it cost to rebuild Gaza?In April, the Gaza Rapid Damage and Needs Assessment (RDNA) estimated it will cost more than $71.4bn over the next 10 years for recovery and Reconstruction of the Gaza Strip. That report estimated that Gaza had suffered $57.9bn in total damage and economic losses.It also found that $26.3bn will be required in the first 18 months of Gaza’s Reconstruction to restore essential services, rebuild critical infrastructure and support its economic recovery.To put $71.4bn into perspective, it’s enough to fund the construction of nearly 48 Burj Khalifas, the world’s tallest building.This is seven times the combined construction following each Israeli military offensive in Gaza over the past two decades, according to Oxfam, which compared recovery-needs assessments across Gaza’s major wars since 2008.