Media coverage
Focus (Germany) · 2025-10-17
Omar Shaban argues that rebuilding Gaza is not merely a technical task but a political process shaped by who will control Gaza, border openings, import rules, and relations with Israel. Although reconstruction costs are estimated at tens of billions of dollars, no binding pledges have been made, and he says rebuilding could take ten years under ideal conditions or twenty if old restrictions remain. He also criticizes planning detached from Gaza’s reality and says the weakness of the Palestinian political system and its outdated political culture are major obstacles alongside the lack of funding.
Omar Shaban argues that rebuilding Gaza is not merely a technical task but a political process shaped by who will control Gaza, border openings, import rules, and relations with Israel. Although reconstruction costs are estimated at tens of billions of dollars, no binding pledges have been made, an…
“Gaza’s reconstruction is more than a technical task — it is a test of political reason and international credibility,” says one of the region’s most clear-sighted analysts. Omar Shaban is an economist from Gaza and founder of the Palestinian research institute Pal-Think for Strategic Studies. He advises international organizations and European governments — and speaks with the disillusionment of a man who knows how far political rhetoric and reality diverge.
At the Arab summit in Cairo in early March, the financial need for reconstruction was estimated at around $51 billion; by now, international organizations and the Palestinian Authority are speaking of up to $70 billion. But so far, no country has made binding commitments. “Everyone is waiting,” says Shaban, “because no one knows whether Hamas will stay or disappear.”
Under ideal circumstances, reconstruction could take ten years. But even that, he says, is an optimistic calculation. Everything depends on factors the Palestinians do not control: border openings, import regulations, the relationship with Israel. If the old system of restrictions and permits remains in place, the process could take “not ten, but twenty years.”
What is decisive, Shaban says, is the psychological beginning: visible progress in the first months, projects that inspire hope — a repaired road, a functioning hospital, a reopened school. “People need to see that something is moving,” he says. “Without hope, there is no reconstruction.”
Omar Shaban is an economist and heads the Palestinian research institute Pal-Think for Strategic Studies in Gaza.
The central planning is being carried out in Ramallah — far removed from the reality of Gaza. International conferences, most recently in London, are dominated by actors who see reconstruction as a business, not as a social process. So far, no government, neither Germany nor Saudi Arabia nor Qatar, has made concrete large-scale commitments. Everyone is waiting to see who will assume political control in Gaza in the future. “If Hamas stays, no money will come — not even from Turkey,” says Shaban. An international or Arab observer force is supposed to fill the power vacuum, but it is not yet operational. A transition period of at least two months is realistic. Until then, Hamas will remain present — not out of strength, but because of a lack of alternatives.
Shaban describes a paradoxical situation: “Hamas knows it cannot lead reconstruction — but it wants to remain part of the game.” At the same time, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is clinging to a system that indirectly benefits Hamas: “He fights it — and at the same time needs it in order to block any Palestinian renewal.”
Despite all his skepticism, Shaban remains cautiously optimistic. The conference in Sharm el-Sheikh, attended by more than twenty states — including the United States, Germany, France, and the United Kingdom — had minimized the risk of political backsliding. But he warns against Western complacency: “Politicians in Berlin or Amsterdam mainly want the fire to stop so that the protests end. After that, they believe they have done their duty.”
## “The world has changed — we have not”
There will be no Marshall Plan in the Middle East modeled on Germany’s postwar reconstruction. The strategic necessity is lacking, as is the ideological pressure that once made Europe the West’s bulwark. So why should the Gulf states invest billions in Gaza today? Arab governments, for their part, asked soberly what Palestine itself had to contribute. “Why should they pour billions into a corrupt, outdated system?” says Shaban.
For him, the weakness lies not only in the lack of money, but in the Palestinians’ political culture: “Our leadership still thinks as it did in the 1960s. The world has changed — we have not.”
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Text © Focus (Germany) — archived here with attribution to the source. — Machine translation for archival reference. — Original source