Gaza City – October 3, 2014

1. Rubble

2. Man touring temporary shelters set up for displaced Gaza residents

3. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Hamdan al-Najjar, Khuzaa resident:

“There are 12 members in my family: six will sleep in the caravan and the other six will stay in the tent until they provide us with shelters. We wish not to stay in caravans for a long time and hope that they will rebuild our houses.”

4. al-Najjar tours home

5. Woman washes clothing

6. Various of rubble

7. SOUNDBITE (English) Robert Turner, Director of UNWRA operations in Gaza:

++NOTE: SOUNDBITE PARTIALLY COVERED++

“Israel has a legitimate security concern about the diversion of material. But I think it can work and to say what we need is, we need the national consensus government physically present so that that mechanism (of rebuilding) can start, and it needs to start soon. It is starting to rain already. The people are frustrated and angry, and they need to see progress. So we are hoping that there will be very tangible, demonstrable progress on the ground soon.”

8. Various of family sitting in tent

STORYLINE:

Hamdan al-Najjar has been sleeping outdoors and his family in a shack of wood scraps and plastic sheets since their three-storey home was reduced to rubble in the recent Israel-Hamas war.

A few days ago, the family from the farming town of Khuzaa, near the Israeli border, found some relief.

The al-Najjars were given one of several dozen tiny metal prefabricated homes set up by a charity next to their razed neighbourhood.

The trailer sleeps six on mattresses that take up most of the floor space, not enough to accommodate all of the al-Najjars, and some will have to stay in the shack.

Hamdan, the 55-year-old patriarch, said he was grateful for the new shelter because of the approaching winter rains, but hopes it won’t be home for too long.

“We wish not to stay in caravans for a long time and hope that they will rebuild our houses,” he said on the day of the handover ceremony, attended by two government ministers and other officials who delivered speeches in the blazing sun before giving the keys to the trailers to al-Najjar and other members of his family.

Al-Najjar is one of tens of thousands in Gaza who were made homeless by the 50-day war and now live in classrooms, storefronts, relatives’ homes, rental apartments or tents.

A conference of donor countries next week in Cairo is being asked to commit four billion US dollars to Gaza, including the rebuilding or repair of more than 60,000 homes, more than 5,000 businesses and dozens of mosques, clinics and schools.

However, scepticism about official promises of speedy reconstruction is common in Gaza and not unfounded.

Successful reconstruction would depend on an unprecedented show of good will and cooperation, not just between Israelis and Palestinians, but between the rival Palestinian political camps led by Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas and the Islamic militant group Hamas.

Those relations have been hostile for years, particularly after Hamas seized Gaza from Abbas in 2007, and Israel and Hamas subsequently fought three wars.

In the war that ended in late August, Israel launched thousands of air strikes at what it said were Hamas-linked targets in Gaza, while Hamas fired thousands of rockets and mortars at Israel.

Compounding the difficulties of reconstruction, the deal brokered by the United Nations after the war is based on gradual steps by Israel and performance benchmarks to be met by Palestinians, in the past a sure recipe for failure.

Israel would have to ease tight border restrictions it imposed, along with Egypt, after the Hamas takeover and gradually allow large quantities of building materials into Gaza.

Loosening the restraints would depend on UN inspectors and forces loyal to Abbas successfully tracking cement and steel shipments in Gaza and keeping them away from Hamas.

In the war, Israel had uncovered and destroyed more than 30 Hamas attack tunnels under the Israel-Gaza border and is concerned Hamas will try to divert building materials for military purposes.

Yet the war has also created a rare convergence of interests between former rivals.

Israel wants long-term quiet on its border with Gaza, and its army chief recently said he believed allowing the import of building materials and restoring livelihoods wiped out by border closures would reduce the risk of another war.

Under a unity deal struck before the war, Hamas was to hand power to an Abbas-led temporary government of independent experts, but would not have to disband its security forces.

Even though the war ended five weeks ago, the unity government hasn’t set up shop in Gaza yet to start dealing with pressing problems there, prompting accusations by Hamas that Abbas is stalling to extract more concessions.

Robert Turner, head of the main UN aid agency in Gaza, said delays come at the expense of Gaza’s population.

The international community has already pledged millions of US dollars for Gaza relief, but Abbas is seeking much larger sums, four billion US dollars for reconstruction and 4.5 billion US dollars in budget support for his government through 2017.