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At Least $53 Billion Needed to Rebuild Gaza, UN Estimates

This picture shows the destroyed Blue Beach Resort in northern Gaza City, on February 11, 2025, amid the current ceasefire deal in the war between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)
This picture shows the destroyed Blue Beach Resort in northern Gaza City, on February 11, 2025, amid the current ceasefire deal in the war between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)
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At Least $53 Billion Needed to Rebuild Gaza, UN Estimates

This picture shows the destroyed Blue Beach Resort in northern Gaza City, on February 11, 2025, amid the current ceasefire deal in the war between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)
This picture shows the destroyed Blue Beach Resort in northern Gaza City, on February 11, 2025, amid the current ceasefire deal in the war between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)

More than $53 billion will be required to rebuild Gaza and end the "humanitarian catastrophe" that has gripped the war-ravaged territory, including $20 billion in the first three years, according to a United Nations estimate released Tuesday.

"While it has not been possible in the current environment to fully assess the totality of needs that will be required in Gaza, the interim assessment offers an early indication of the enormous scale of recovery and reconstruction needs in the Gaza Strip," UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a report.

The Gaza war has been paused since mid-January under the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas that was brokered by Qatar, Egypt and the United States.

More than 48,000 Palestinians have been killed in the last 16 months, the Gaza health ministry says, and nearly all of Gaza's population has been internally displaced by the conflict, which has caused a hunger crisis.

Some 1,200 people were killed in the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on southern Israeli communities and about 250 were taken to Gaza as hostages, Israeli tallies show.

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Israeli Strikes Kill 12 in Lebanon, including 5 Hezbollah Fighters

Women walk near destroyed buildings, with one holding the flag of Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila, after an Israeli military spokesperson said that Israel would keep troops in several posts in southern Lebanon past the deadline for them to withdraw, February 18, 2025 - Reuters reported.
Women walk near destroyed buildings, with one holding the flag of Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila, after an Israeli military spokesperson said that Israel would keep troops in several posts in southern Lebanon past the deadline for them to withdraw, February 18, 2025 - Reuters reported.
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Israeli Strikes Kill 12 in Lebanon, including 5 Hezbollah Fighters

Women walk near destroyed buildings, with one holding the flag of Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila, after an Israeli military spokesperson said that Israel would keep troops in several posts in southern Lebanon past the deadline for them to withdraw, February 18, 2025 - Reuters reported.
Women walk near destroyed buildings, with one holding the flag of Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila, after an Israeli military spokesperson said that Israel would keep troops in several posts in southern Lebanon past the deadline for them to withdraw, February 18, 2025 - Reuters reported.

Heavy Israeli airstrikes killed 12 people, including five Hezbollah fighters, in eastern Lebanon on Tuesday, a security source in Lebanon said, in what Israel said was a warning to the Iran-backed group against trying to re-establish itself.

The Israeli military said the airstrikes targeted training camps used by elite Hezbollah fighters and warehouses it used to store weapons in the Bekaa Valley region of eastern Lebanon.

The airstrikes were the deadliest on the area since a US-brokered ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel last November. Bachir Khodr, governor of the Bekaa region, said seven of the dead were Syrian nationals.

Israel dealt Hezbollah heavy blows in last year's conflict, killing its leader Hassan Nasrallah along with other commanders and destroying much of its arsenal.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Tuesday's strikes sent a "clear message" to Hezbollah, accusing it of planning to rebuild the capability to raid Israel through the elite Radwan force, Reuters reported.

Israel "will respond with maximum force to any attempt at rebuilding", he said. He added that strikes were also a message to the Lebanese government, saying it was responsible for upholding the ceasefire agreement.

There was no immediate public response from Hezbollah or from the Lebanese government to the latest Israeli strikes.

The United States has submitted a proposal to the Lebanese government aimed at securing Hezbollah's disarmament within four months in exchange for Israel halting airstrikes and withdrawing troops from positions they still hold in south Lebanon.

Under the terms of the ceasefire brokered by the US and France, Lebanon's armed forces were to confiscate "all unauthorized arms", beginning in the area south of the Litani River - the zone closest to Israel.