How Arab states are aiding Palestinians amid Gaza’s deepening humanitarian emergency 

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Saudi Arabia and the UAE have pledged assistance to Gaza, but aid agencies have struggled to gain access via the Rafah border crossing. (Getty Images/AFP)
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Updated 20 October 2023
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How Arab states are aiding Palestinians amid Gaza’s deepening humanitarian emergency 

  • Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar have pledged millions of dollars to assist Palestinians under Israeli bombardment 
  • Gaza has been under strict Israeli embargo since Hamas launched its cross-border attack on Israel on October 7

RIYADH: As the humanitarian crisis in Gaza worsens in tandem with Israel’s expanding war with the Palestinian militant group Hamas, the Arab Gulf states have been pledging aid and support to assist civilians living under siege and daily bombardment.

Since Hamas launched its unprecedented cross-border attack on Israel on Oct. 7, Gaza has been under strict Israeli embargo, depriving its 2.2 million-strong population of food, water, medicine, and electricity.

Gaza’s only power plant quickly shut down owing to a lack of fuel. According to the UN, hospitals in the Gaza Strip, where thousands of civilians have taken shelter, are expected to run out of generator fuel within days, putting the lives of patients at risk.

The siege, combined with the closure of the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, meant that humanitarian aid agencies found it impossible to deliver assistance. More than 200 trucks and some 3,000 tons of aid are reported to be positioned at or near the Rafah crossing, Gaza’s only connection to Egypt.

UNICEF, the UN children’s agency, has said that unless water and fuel are sent “immediately,” Gaza inhabitants are in “imminent danger” of epidemics and death.

 

 

On Wednesday, Israel said it would allow Egypt to deliver limited humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip. The announcement to allow water, food, and other supplies came as anger over the blast at Gaza City’s Al-Ahli Hospital spread across the Middle East, and as US President Joe Biden visited Israel in hopes of preventing a wider conflict in the region.

Biden said Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi agreed to open the crossing and to let in an initial group of 20 trucks with humanitarian aid. The convoy would start moving on Friday at the earliest, White House officials said.




Medics and a convoy of trucks loaded with aid supplies for Gaza provided by Egyptian NGOs waits for an agreement to cross through the Egypt-Gaza border in Arish City in Egypt’s north Sinai Peninsula on October 15, 2023. (AFP)

The office of the Israeli prime minister said Israel “will not thwart” deliveries of food, water, or medicine from Egypt, as long as they are limited to civilians in the south of Gaza and do not go to Hamas militants.

Supplies would go in under the supervision of the UN, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry told Al-Arabiya TV.

The Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing has been bombed multiple times since Israel launched its war on Hamas. Egypt will have to repair the road across the border that was cratered by Israeli airstrikes.




Medics and a convoy of trucks loaded with aid supplies for Gaza provided by Egyptian NGOs waits for an agreement to cross through the Egypt-Gaza border in Arish City in Egypt’s north Sinai Peninsula on October 15, 2023. (AFP)

“At this stage, we can’t bring aid into Gaza,” Christoph Hangar, a spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross in Geneva, told Arab News before the Israeli announcement was made.

“We are pre-positioning staff and relief items as we speak so we’re ready when access to Gaza is granted, which it must urgently be.”

In response to the deepening humanitarian emergency, Arab Gulf states have renewed their commitment to the resolution of the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict and pledged millions of dollars in aid to the relief effort.




Volunteers and NGO workers stand near tents that they set up along the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing on October 19, 2023, demanding clearance for an aid convoy to enter the Gaza Strip. (AFP)

Israel has ordered residents of north Gaza to leave for the south, hoping perhaps to clear the area of civilians in preparation for a ground invasion, which would likely involve brutal urban combat.

The Oct. 7 attack killed at least 1,400 people, most of them Israeli civilians, and resulted in the capture of more than 200 people, who are now being held hostage in Gaza by Hamas and other “resistance factions.”

The presence of the hostages in the enclave has complicated Israel’s plans for a ground invasion.

INNUMBERS

2.4 million Population of the Gaza Strip.

1 million People displaced by the Israeli bombardment.

3,000 Palestinians killed across the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7.

$2 million Money donated to UNRWA by Saudi Arabia.

$6 billion Funding provided to Palestinians by KSrelief since 2000.

Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general, was due to meet El-Sisi in Egypt on Thursday to discuss how to get humanitarian aid into Gaza.

Stephane Dujarric, the spokesperson for the UN chief, said in a statement: “Obviously, in order to move humanitarian aid through Gaza, we need safe passage. We can’t move humanitarian trucks and convoys while active bombardment is ongoing.

“There are intense discussions going on in which we’re involved with a number of parties in order to try to get the most basic humanitarian aid in as quickly as possible and that’s food, water, medicine. Those things are urgently needed.”




Boxes of humanitarian aid and supplies from the Jordan Hashemite Charity Organization are loaded aboard cargo planes in Amman, Jordan, for Gaza on Oct. 12, 2023. (REUTERS)

“Since the creation of Israel, the Saudi population and government have always been very sympathetic to the Palestinian cause,” Khaled Al-Maeena, a Saudi political commentator, told Arab News.

“It was done out of genuine goodwill for the Palestinian people who were oppressed and whose lands were occupied. What we are witnessing now is a Palestinian holocaust.”

Since 2000, the Saudi aid agency KSrelief has provided more than $6 billion in aid to the Palestinian people across multiple sectors, including food security, health, education, water, sanitation, and shelter.

In 2022 alone, Saudi Arabia contributed $27 million to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees. On Monday, Saudi Arabia announced it would be donating a further $2 million to UNRWA.




Saudi humanitarian aid group KSrelief has a continuing food basket distribution project in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. (KSrelief photo)

The money was presented to Philippe Lazzarini, the UNRWA commissioner general, by Naif Al-Sudairi, the Saudi ambassador to Jordan, at the Saudi Embassy in Amman on Sunday.

Saudi Arabia’s private sector has also been making pledges. McDonald’s KSA has publicly announced it will be donating $533,000 to Gaza relief efforts, stating it was “proud of its Saudi identity” and support for humanitarian issues.

“As a purely Saudi company, we have been proud, since our inception, of our Saudi identity, and our continuous contribution to supporting our economy and national community and adopting social and humanitarian matters that our community is concerned with,” the restaurant chain said in an online statement.

“We are delighted to announce that McDonald’s KSA will be donating SR2 million ($533,201) to support the relief efforts for the citizens of Gaza, may God help them. This contribution follows coordination with the relevant official authorities.”

Prior to the conflict, US-brokered talks had been underway concerning the potential normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel pending clear signs of progress on the status of the Palestinians.

In August, while these talks were ongoing, the Kingdom also offered to resume financial support for the Palestinian Authority.

How the present crisis will impact the normalization talks remains to be seen, but the Kingdom’s stance on the need to resolve the Palestinian question remains unchanged.

In a statement following the Hamas attack, the Saudi Foreign Ministry said it was “renewing its call on the international community to assume its responsibilities and activate a credible peace process that leads to a two-state solution in a way that achieves security and peace in the region and protects civilians.”




Staff members unload aid for the Palestinian Gaza Strip from an Emirates cargo plane on the tarmac of Egypt's el-Arish airport in the north Sinai Peninsula on October 19, 2023. (AFP)

In 2020, the UAE became the first Arab Gulf state to normalize relations with Israel under the US-brokered Abraham Accords.

A Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement between the two countries came into effect in March this year, signifying Israel’s first free trade agreement with an Arab state. Bahrain and Morocco followed suit.

In response to the crisis now unfolding in Gaza, the UAE has launched a campaign dubbed Tarahum — or “compassion” in Arabic — to help vulnerable civilians, particularly the 1 million children who make up nearly half of Gaza’s population.

Overseen by the Emirates Red Crescent, the UAE has called for donations and volunteers, with its first relief center established at the Abu Dhabi Cruise Terminal.




UAE's Sheikh Theyab bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, accompanied by other top officials, visits the Tarahum - for Gaza campaign center in Abu Dhabi, which opened on October 15. Other aid collection centers will also be opened across the ‎UAE at later dates. (WAM photo)

A plane carrying medical supplies has already been sent to the Egyptian city of El-Arish before onward transit to the Rafah border crossing, according to the Emirati state news agency WAM.

On Tuesday, Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, prime minister of the UAE, directed the provision of $20 million in humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people.

Qatar has likewise established its own aid effort, deploying a plane bound for El-Arish on Monday carrying 37 tons of food and medical aid, provided by the Qatar Fund for Development under the direction of Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani.

“This aid is part of the State of Qatar’s full support for the fraternal Palestinian people amid the difficult humanitarian conditions due to the Israeli bombardment on the Gaza Strip,” Qatar’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.




Qatari Air Force crew load food and medical aid to a cargo plane on October 16, 2023, at Al Udeid Air Base in Doha. The humanitarian aid from the Qatar Fund for Development is headed to Egypt for Gaza refugees. (Qatar News Agency/Handout via REUTERS)

Palestinians have been massing at the sealed Rafah border crossing since the crisis began, in the hope of leaving Gaza before the much talked about ground offensive begins. On the other side of the border fence, aid agencies are powerless to intervene.

“We are exploring all avenues to bring life-saving aid into Gaza,” said Hangar of the ICRC. “This initial goods convoy includes medicine and thousands of household kits for families which include hygiene items and chlorine tablets for drinking water.”

He added: “We are also urgently deploying staff to relieve colleagues in Gaza whenever we are able to move in. This includes a mobile surgical team and other health staff, a weapons contamination expert, and relief coordinators specialized in water and habitat and food security.”

 


Why were so many Thai farmers among the hostages held by Hamas?

Updated 08 June 2025
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Why were so many Thai farmers among the hostages held by Hamas?

  • Before the Oct. 7, 2023, attack by Hamas, Israel had 30,000 Thai laborers, primarily working on farms
  • 31 Thais were taken hostages. Thailand’s foreign ministry has said 46 Thais have been killed during the war

BANGKOK: Israel says it has retrieved the body of a 35-year-old Thai hostage who was abducted into Gaza during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that sparked the war.
Nattapong Pinta was among 31 Thais taken by the Hamas militant group. Thailand’s foreign ministry in a statement Saturday confirmed that Pinta, the last Thai hostage in Gaza, was confirmed dead. It said the bodies of two others have yet to be retrieved.
The ministry has said 46 Thais have been killed during the war. Thais were the largest group of foreigners held captive by Hamas. They were among tens of thousands of Thai workers in Israel. Here’s a look at what they were doing.
Why are there so many Thais in Israel?
Israel once relied heavily on Palestinian workers, but it started bringing in large numbers of migrant workers after the 1987-93 Palestinian revolt, known as the first Intifada.
Most came from Thailand, and Thais remain the largest group of foreign agricultural laborers in Israel today, earning considerably more than they can at home.
Thailand and Israel implemented a bilateral agreement a decade ago to ease the way for workers in the agriculture sector.
Israel has come under criticism for the conditions under which the Thai farm laborers work. A Human Rights Watch report in 2015 said they often were housed in makeshift and inadequate accommodation and “were paid salaries significantly below the legal minimum wage, forced to work long hours in excess of the legal maximum, subjected to unsafe working conditions and denied their right to change employers.”
A watchdog group found more recently that most were still paid below the legal minimum wage.
How many Thai nationals work in Israel?
There were about 30,000 Thai workers, primarily working on farms, in Israel prior to the attack by Hamas.
In the wake of the attack, some 7,000 returned home, primarily on government evacuation flights, but higher wages than those available at home have continued to attract new arrivals.
The Thai ambassador to Israel, Pannabha Chandraramya, recently said there are now more than 38,000 Thai workers in the country.
What happened after some left?
Faced with a labor shortage in the wake of the exodus, Israel’s Agriculture Ministry announced incentives to try to attract foreign workers back to evacuated areas.
Among other things, it offered to extend work visas and to pay bonuses of about $500 a month.
Thailand’s Labor Ministry granted 3,966 Thai workers permission to work in Israel in 2024, keeping Israel in the top four destinations for Thais working abroad last year.
Thai migrant workers generally come from poorer regions of the country, especially the northeast, and even before the bonuses, the jobs in Israel paid many times what they could make at home.


Israel backs an anti-Hamas armed group known for looting aid in Gaza. Here’s what we know

Updated 08 June 2025
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Israel backs an anti-Hamas armed group known for looting aid in Gaza. Here’s what we know

IJERUSALEM: Israel is supporting armed groups of Palestinians in Gaza in what it says is a move to counter Hamas. But officials from the UN and aid organizations say the military is allowing them to loot food and other supplies from their trucks.
One self-styled militia, which calls itself the Popular Forces, led by Yasser Abu Shabab, says it is guarding newly created, Israeli-backed food distribution centers in southern Gaza. Aid workers say it has a long history of looting UN trucks.
Gaza’s armed groups have ties to powerful clans or extended families and often operate as criminal gangs. Aid workers allege Israel’s backing of the groups is part of a wider effort to control all aid operations in the strip.
Israel denies allowing looters to operate in areas it controls.
Here’s what we know about anti-Hamas armed groups in Gaza:
Who are these groups?
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a social media video Thursday that Israel had “activated” clans in Gaza to oppose Hamas.
He didn’t elaborate how Israel is supporting them or what role Israel wants them to play. Netanyahu’s comments were in response to a political opponent accusing him of arming “crime families” in Gaza.
Clans, tribes and extended families have strong influence in Gaza, where their leaders often help mediate disputes. Some have long been armed to protect their group’s interests, and some have morphed into gangs involved in smuggling drugs or running protection rackets.
After seizing power in 2007, Hamas clamped down on Gaza’s gangs — sometimes with brute force and sometimes by steering perks their way.
But with Hamas’ weakening power after 20 months of war with Israel, gangs have regained freedom to act. The leadership of a number of clans — including the clan from which the Abu Shabab group’s members hail — have issued statements denouncing looting and cooperation with Israel.
 

Israeli security forces detain a man during an attempt by right-wing protesters to block aid trucks from entering Gaza at the Kerem Shalom crossing on May 21, 2025. (AFP/File)

A self-proclaimed ‘nationalist force’
Besides the Abu Shabab group, it is not known how many armed groups Israel is supporting.
The Abu Shabab group went public in early May, declaring itself a “nationalist force.” It said it was protecting aid, including around the food distribution hubs run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a mainly American private contractor that Israel intends to replace the UN-led aid network. Aid workers and Palestinians who know the group estimate it has several hundred fighters.
The Abu Shabab group’s media office told The Associated Press it was collaborating with GHF “to ensure that the food and medicine reaches its beneficiaries.” It said it was not involved in distribution, but that its fighters secured the surroundings of distribution centers run by GHF inside military-controlled zones in the Rafah area.
A spokesperson with GHF said it had “no collaboration” with Abu Shabab.
“We do have local Palestinian workers we are very proud of, but none is armed, and they do not belong to Abu Shabab’s organization,” the spokesperson said, speaking on condition of anonymity in accordance with the group’s rules.
Before the war, Yasser Abu Shabab was involved in smuggling cigarettes and drugs from Egypt and Israel into Gaza through crossings and tunnels, according to two members of his extended family, one of whom was once part of his group. Hamas arrested Abu Shabab but freed him from prison along with most other inmates when the war began in October 2023, they said, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
Abu Shabab’s media office said he was summoned by police before the war but wasn’t officially accused or tried. It also said claims the group was involved in attacking aid trucks were “exaggerated,” saying its fighters “took the minimum amount of food and water necessary.”
Aid workers say it is notorious for looting
The head of the association in Gaza that provides trucks and drivers for aid groups said their members’ vehicles have been attacked many times by Abu Shabab’s fighters.
Nahed Sheheiber said the group has been active in Israeli-controlled eastern parts of Rafah and Khan Younis, targeting trucks as they enter Gaza from the Kerem Shalom crossing with Israel. Troops nearby “did nothing” to stop attacks, he said.
Sheheiber said that when Hamas policemen have tried to confront gangs or guard truck convoys, they were attacked by Israeli troops.
One driver, Issam Abu Awda, told the AP he was attacked by Abu Shabab fighters last July. The fighters stopped his truck, blindfolded and handcuffed him and his assistant, then loaded the supplies off the vehicle, he said. Abu Awda said nearby Israeli troops didn’t intervene.
These kinds of attacks are still happening and highlight “a disturbing pattern,” according to Jonathan Whittall, from the UN humanitarian coordinator, OCHA.
“Those who have blocked and violently ransacked aid trucks seem to have been protected” by Israeli forces, said Whittall, head of OCHA’s office for the occupied Palestinian territories. And, he added, they have now become the “protectors of the goods being distributed through Israel’s new militarized hubs,” referring to the GHF-run sites.
The Israeli military did not reply when asked for comment on allegations it has allowed armed groups to loot trucks. But the Israeli prime minister’s office called the accusations “fake news,” saying, “Israel didn’t allow looters to operate in Israeli controlled areas.”
Israel often accuses Hamas of stealing from trucks.
What does all this have to do with aid?
Muhammad Shehada, a political analyst from Gaza who is a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said he doesn’t believe Israel’s support for armed groups is aimed at directly fighting Hamas. So far there has been no attempt to deploy the groups against the militants.
Instead, he said, Israel is using the gangs and the looting to present GHF “as the only alternative to provide food to Palestinians,” since its supplies get in while the UN’s don’t.
Israel wants the GHF to replace the UN-led aid system because it claims Hamas has been siphoning off large amounts of supplies. The UN denies that significant amounts have been taken by Hamas. Israel has also said it aims to move all Palestinians in Gaza to a “sterile zone” in the south, around the food hubs, while it fights Hamas elsewhere.
The UN and aid groups have rejected that as using food as a tool for forced displacement. The Abu Shabab group has issued videos online urging Palestinians to move to tent camps in Rafah.
Israel barred all food and other supplies from entering Gaza for 2 ½ months , pending the start of GHF – a blockade that has brought the population to the brink of famine. GHF started distributing food boxes on May 26 at three hubs guarded by private contractors inside Israeli military zones.
Israel has let in some trucks of aid for the UN to distribute. But the UN says it has been able to get little of it into the hands of Palestinians because of Israeli military restrictions, including requiring its trucks to use roads where looters are known to operate.
“It’s Israel’s way of telling the UN, if you want to try to bring aid into Gaza, good luck with this,” said Shehada. “We will force you to go through a road where everything you brought will be looted.”
 


US-backed Gaza group suspends aid for a day over threats, Hamas vows to protect UN aid

Updated 08 June 2025
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US-backed Gaza group suspends aid for a day over threats, Hamas vows to protect UN aid

  • The Hamas-run Gaza government media office said later on Saturday that GHF operation has "utterly failed on all levels" and that Hamas was ready to help secure aid deliveries by a separate long-running U.N-led humanitarian operation

JERUSALEM/CAIRO: A controversial humanitarian organization backed by the United States and Israel did not distribute any food aid on Saturday, accusing Hamas of making threats that "made it impossible" to operate in the enclave, which the Palestinian militants denied.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which uses private U.S. security and logistics firms to operate, said it was adapting operations to overcome the unspecified threats. It later said in a Facebook post that two sites would reopen on Sunday.
A Hamas official told Reuters he had no knowledge of such "alleged threats."
The Hamas-run Gaza government media office said later on Saturday that GHF operation has "utterly failed on all levels" and that Hamas was ready to help secure aid deliveries by a separate long-running U.N-led humanitarian operation. Hamas also called on all Palestinians to protect humanitarian convoys.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Hamas source says to deploy snipers to protect U.N. aid convoys

• US-backed aid group says to resume distribution on Sunday

• Nattapong Pinta among 251 abducted by Hamas in October 2023

• 55 Palestinians killed in latest Israeli airstrikes -Gaza medics

Israel and the United States have accused Hamas of stealing aid from the U.N.-led operations, which the militants deny.
A Hamas source said the group's armed wing would deploy some snipers from Sunday near routes used by the U.N.-led aid operation to prevent armed gangs looting food shipments. The U.N. did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Israel allowed limited U.N.-led operations to resume on May 19 after an 11-week blockade in the enclave of 2.3 million people, where experts have warned a famine looms. The U.N. has described the aid allowed into Gaza as "drop in the ocean."
Israel and the U.S. are urging the U.N. to work through the GHF, but the U.N. has refused, questioning its neutrality and accusing the distribution model of militarizing aid and forcing displacement. The GHF began operations in Gaza on May 26 and said on Friday so far it has distributed nearly 9 million meals.
While the GHF has said there have been no incidents at its so-called secure distribution sites, Palestinians seeking aid have described disorder and access routes to the sites have been beset by chaos and deadly violence.
Dozens of Palestinians were killed near GHF sites between Sunday and Tuesday, Gaza health authorities said. Israel has said it is investigating the Monday and Tuesday incidents, but said it was not to blame for Sunday's violence.

HOSPITAL FUEL LOW
The GHF did not give out aid on Wednesday as it pressed Israel to boost civilian safety beyond its sites, then on Friday it paused some aid distribution "due to excessive crowding."
The Israeli military said on Saturday that 350 trucks of humanitarian aid belonging to the U.N. and other international relief groups were transferred this week via the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza.
Israel makes the U.N. offload aid on the Palestinian side of the crossing, where it then has to be picked by the U.N. and aid groups in Gaza. The U.N. has accused Israel of regularly denying access requests and complained that its aid convoys have been looted by unidentified armed men and hungry civilians.
Israel has in recent weeks expanded its offensive across the Gaza Strip as U.S., Qatari and Egyptian-led efforts to secure another ceasefire have faltered. Medics in Gaza said 55 people were killed in Israeli strikes across the enclave on Saturday.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said on Saturday that Gaza's hospitals only had fuel for three more days and that Israel was denying access for international relief agencies to areas where fuel storages designated for hospitals are located.
There was no immediate response from the Israeli military or COGAT, the Israeli defence agency that coordinates humanitarian matters with the Palestinians.
Meanwhile, the Israeli military said it had uncovered "an underground tunnel route, including a command and control center from which senior Hamas commanders" operated beneath the European Hospital compound in southern Gaza.
The war erupted after Hamas-led militants took 251 hostages and killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, in the Oct. 7, 2023, attack, Israel's single deadliest day.
Israel's military campaign has since killed more than 54,000 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to health authorities in Gaza, and flattened much of the coastal enclave.
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday the Israeli military had retrieved the body of a Thai agricultural worker held in Gaza since the October 2023 attack. Nattapong Pinta's body was held by the Mujahedeen Brigades militant group, and recovered from Rafah in southern Gaza, Katz said.

 


Thousands protest in Tel Aviv for release of Gaza hostages

Updated 07 June 2025
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Thousands protest in Tel Aviv for release of Gaza hostages

  • The crowd gathered at the so-called Hostages Square chanting “The people choose the hostages!“
  • Earlier on Saturday, Hamas released a photograph of one of the remaining hostages, Matan Zangauker, appearing to be in poor health

TEL AVIV: Thousands of people demonstrated Saturday night in Tel Aviv to demand the release of hostages held in the Gaza Strip and a ceasefire after 20 months of war between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas.

The crowd gathered at the so-called Hostages Square chanting “The people choose the hostages!” and demanding “a comprehensive deal” for their return, according to a statement from the Hostages and Missing Families Forum.

Earlier on Saturday, Hamas released a photograph of one of the remaining hostages, Matan Zangauker, appearing to be in poor health, with a warning that he would not survive.

His mother, Einav Zangauker, speaking at the protest in Tel Aviv, said “I can no longer bear this nightmare. The angel of death, Netanyahu, continues to sacrifice the hostages,” AFPTV footage showed, referring to the Israeli prime minister.

Noam Katz, the daughter of hostage Lior Rudaeff, who has been declared dead but whose body is still in the Gaza Strip, called for an immediate halt to the fighting.

“Do not send more soldiers to risk their lives to bring back our fathers. Bring them back through an agreement. Stop the war!” she declared to the crowd at the square, the Families Forum said.

On Friday, the Israeli army announced the death of four soldiers in the Gaza Strip and said it lacked 10,000 troops to meet its needs in the Palestinian territory.

Negotiations aimed at ending the fighting, mediated by Egypt, Qatar and the United States have remained unsuccessful so far.

Tal Kupershtein, father of Bar Kupershtein, who was abducted at the age of 21, demanded that his son “come home now!“

“I call on the prime minister to accept an agreement for the return of all the hostages.”

Of the 251 people abducted on October 7, 2023, 55 are still held in the Gaza Strip, at least 31 of whom are dead, according to Israeli authorities.


What will it take for Syria to win permanent US sanctions relief?

Updated 08 June 2025
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What will it take for Syria to win permanent US sanctions relief?

  • Temporary relief already available, but a lasting end to sanctions depends on several steps, experts say
  • They say that without deep reforms and sustained diplomacy, reprieve could be short lived

LONDON: After 13 years of war and international isolation, a glimmer of hope emerged for Syria on May 23 when the US government announced a temporary easing of sanctions, ushering in an opportunity for recovery and reconstruction.

But Syrian officials warn the relief may be short-lived. Without the full and permanent lifting of restrictions, they say, the door to recovery could close just as quickly as it opened, especially with fresh conditions now attached.

Syria’s interim government, led by President Ahmad Al-Sharaa, must navigate multiple US demands, from expelling foreign militants to integrating Kurdish forces and verifying the destruction of chemical weapons.

Syria's interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa has in six months established himself internationally and had crippling sanctions removed, but still needs to rebuild national institutions, revive the economy and unite the fractured country. (AFP/File)

The road to full sanctions relief is further complicated by political realities in Washington, where a divided Congress remains largely opposed to reengaging with Damascus.

“There is considerable disappointment in Damascus that sanctions are only being suspended temporarily and not definitively,” Joshua Landis, director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, told Arab News.

“But many of the sanctions were imposed by Congress and will have to be lifted by Congress.”

Following President Donald Trump’s announcement at the Gulf Cooperation Council summit in Riyadh, where he offered Syria “a fresh start” by removing sanctions, the Treasury Department issued General License 25, temporarily suspending key restrictions.

A handout picture provided by the Saudi Royal Palace shows US President Donald Trump (L), Secretary of State Marco Rubio (2nd L), Syria's interim president Ahmed Al-Sharaa (R), Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (C) and Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan (2nd R) meeting in Riyadh on May 14, 2025. (AFP/File)

The Treasury said relief was conditional on Syria denying safe haven to terrorist groups and protecting religious and ethnic minorities.

Parallel to this, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced a 180-day Caesar Act waiver to enable humanitarian aid to enter Syria and help restore essential services like electricity, water, and sanitation.

FAST FACTS

• Western sanctions began in 1979 and expanded sharply after 2011 in response to Bashar Assad’s crackdown on protests.

• Arms embargoes and dual-use controls remain, and new targeted sanctions have been imposed on human rights abusers.

• In May, the US and EU lifted most economic sanctions after Assad’s ouster and the formation of a transitional government.

This relief marked the first phase of a broader US strategy aimed at pushing Syria’s interim government to meet a series of sweeping demands.

A US official told AFP that while some Trump administration officials support immediate sanctions relief, others prefer a phased approach, making broader actions conditional on Syria meeting specific targets.

This shift reflects a broader recalibration of Western expectations. “With the fall of the Assad regime, the US and its European allies have clearly stepped back from the demands they once directed at Damascus,” Syrian-Canadian analyst Camille Otrakji told Arab News.

“US Vice President JD Vance has repeatedly stated that his country will not promote democracy anymore. The new priority is stability, seen as a foundation for regional development and future peace agreements.”

People celebrate in Damascus' Omeyyad Square after US President Donald Trump's decision to lift sanctions in Syria, on May 13, 2025. (AFP/File)

As part of that shift, Washington’s earlier insistence on compliance with UN Security Council Resolution 2254 — adopted in 2015 to guide Syria’s democratic transition — has largely faded. In its place, Otrakji said, are more focused and immediate goals.

These include “removing foreign fighters from the Syrian army, and possibly from Syria as a whole, reaching a settlement with the Kurds, and reducing violence against Alawite communities in the coastal region,” he added.

Yet even these goals appear increasingly flexible. On June 2, the US gave its approval to a Syrian government plan to integrate thousands of foreign fighters into the national army, as long as the process remains transparent, Reuters reported.

Despite the evolving benchmarks, progress is underway. Landis explained that Al-Sharaa is already working to fulfill US demands, including the removal of Palestinian militants.

“Al-Sharaa has arrested or expelled the top Palestinian militia leaders and militants living in Syria,” Landis said.

Leaders of pro-Iran Palestinian factions allied with the Assad regime have left Syria under pressure from the new authorities, handing over their weapons as part of a broader US demand to curb Iran-backed groups, two Palestinian sources told AFP on May 23.

Syria is also under pressure to integrate the US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces into the national military and take responsibility for prisons and camps holding thousands of Daesh fighters and their families.

In March, Syria’s President Ahmad Al-Sharaa and SDF chief Mazloum Abdi signed an agreement to integrate the civil and military institutions of the autonomous Kurdish administration in the northeast into the national government. (AFP/File)

“Securing Daesh detention centers will require coordination with the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria and the SDF,” Landis said. “The effort to find a compromise with US-backed Kurdish forces continues, despite some important differences.

“Two Aleppo neighborhoods were recently turned over by the YPG to Al-Sharaa’s forces. More recently, a prison exchange was negotiated between the new Syrian military and the SDF.”

After Daesh’s 2019 defeat, thousands of suspected affiliates were detained in northeast Syria. The largest camps, Al-Hol and Roj, are run by the Kurdish-led AANES and guarded by the SDF.

Security at the camps is fragile, with the SDF stretched by conflict with Turkish-backed forces and resource shortages. A 2023 Daesh attack on Al-Hasakah prison highlighted the risk of mass escapes.

Aid cuts and a potential US withdrawal from northeast Syria threaten further destabilization, raising fears that thousands of Daesh-affiliated detainees could escape, posing a threat to global security.

A view of Camp Roj in Syria's northeastern Hasakah province, where relatives of Daesh militants are being held. (AFP/File)

Recent developments suggest progress. In March, the Al-Sharaa government reached key agreements with the Kurdish-led administration to integrate the SDF into the national army, place Kurdish-run institutions under central control, and jointly manage Daesh detainees.

The first formal steps followed in May, when Kurdish authorities and Syria’s transitional government agreed on a plan to evacuate Syrians from Al-Hol camp to government-held areas. Previously, repatriations had only been allowed to Kurdish-controlled zones.

In Aleppo, the YPG, which is a component of the SDF, handed over the Sheikh Maqsoud and Achrafieh neighborhoods to the Syrian government. These predominantly Kurdish districts had been under YPG/SDF control since 2015 and remained semi-autonomous even after the Assad government recaptured most of Aleppo in 2016.

Landis said similar negotiations are underway with Druze militias in southern Syria. “Arriving at an agreed-upon solution will take time, and both sides are still debating how integral regional militias will be allowed to remain and how much local authority their commanders will have,” he said.

In the past few months, Syria’s Druze community has faced renewed violence and sectarian tensions, particularly in areas near Damascus like Jaramana and Sahnaya.

Mourners lift a portrait during the funeral of members of Syria's Druze community who were killed in recent sectarian clashes, in Salkhad village in the country's southern Suwayda governorate on May 3, 2025. (AFP/File)

In late April, a fake audio recording triggered sectarian violence in the Damascus suburbs of Jaramana and Sahnaya. Clashes between Druze militias, Sunni groups, and government forces left dozens of civilians dead. Human rights monitors reported extrajudicial killings by government-affiliated units.

Although local ceasefires and Druze police deployments have eased tensions in some areas, mistrust runs deep. The Druze community continues to demand greater autonomy and security guarantees, resisting government disarmament efforts amid fears of future attacks.

Concerns have been amplified by sectarian killings targeting the Alawite community, particularly along Syria’s coast. Between March and April, armed groups — including some tied to the transitional government — reportedly executed Alawite civilians and torched their homes.

People march in Syria's northeastern city of Qamishli on March 11, 2025 to protest the wave of sectarian violence targeting the Alawite minority in the west of the country. (AFP/File)

On May 28, the EU sanctioned two individuals and three groups accused of carrying out the attacks. While the EU has announced plans to lift sanctions, foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said the move was “conditional” and that sanctions could be resumed if Syria’s new government does not keep the peace.

That fragile peace, analysts say, depends largely on how the transitional leadership navigates Syria’s complex social fabric.

“For the new transitional leadership, managing relationships with Syria’s minorities and broader society, each with its own aspirations, will be essential to stabilizing the country and permanently lifting the threat of renewed US sanctions,” said Otrakji.

One of the most delicate challenges, he said, lies in the relationship between Al-Sharaa’s administration and the Alawite community, which held significant power under the Assad regime.

“Establishing a local police or security force may be the only realistic solution to address mutual distrust and security concerns,” Otrakji said.

“A handful of influential Alawite figures are now competing to convince their community, and other relevant actors, that they should play the leading role in protecting and representing Alawite interests.”

As Al-Sharaa struggles to assert control, fears of renewed civil war persist. US Secretary of State Rubio warned in late May that Syria could be only weeks away from “potential collapse and a full-scale civil war of epic proportions.”

Progressing to the next phase of US relief will require Syria to normalize relations with Israel by joining the Abraham Accords.

Israeli troops deploy at the buffer zone that separates the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights from Syria, on December 9, 2024, near the Druze village of Majdal Shams. (AFP/File)

The Abraham Accords are a series of diplomatic agreements brokered by the US in 2020, normalizing relations between Israel and several Arab states, including the UAE, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco.

The accords marked a significant shift in Middle East diplomacy, promoting cooperation despite the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Their potential has been undermined, however, by public outcry over the war in Gaza.

Al-Sharaa has publicly signaled openness to diplomacy. “Al-Sharaa has reiterated his interest in arriving at a peaceful settlement with Israel,” said Landis. “He has made a trust-building gesture by handing over the papers of the celebrated Israeli spy Eli Cohen.”

The Syrian leadership reportedly approved last month’s return of 2,500 documents related to Cohen and his personal belongings. The Israeli spy was executed in Damascus in 1965. The archive, held by Syrian intelligence for six decades, included his letters, will, passports, and surveillance photos.

“Word is that Al-Sharaa has also been trying to reach out to Israel through the US to establish talks,” Landis said.


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Despite Syrian statements seeking peace, Israel remains cautious. Since Assad’s fall, it has conducted hundreds of airstrikes across Syria and seized control of a UN-monitored buffer zone inside Syrian territory.

Taking advantage of the power vacuum left by Assad’s ouster, Israeli troops advanced up to 15 km into Syrian territory, establishing a “zone of control” and a deeper “sphere of influence” reaching as far as 60 km east, particularly in the southern provinces of Quneitra and Daraa.

In recent months, the Israeli military has established at least nine new outposts and bases, including on Mount Hermon and within the former UN Disengagement Observer Force buffer zone. Israeli troops have also occupied several Syrian villages, including Al-Kiswa, Al-Bakar, Sidon Al-Golan, Sidon Al-Hanout and Al-Adnaniyah.

Still, some see potential for reconciliation. “The majority of Syrians want to have peace at home, and they want to have peace in the neighborhood,” Ibrahim Al-Assil, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, told CNN.

“The issue with Israel is indeed complicated, but it’s not impossible to resolve the issue of the Golan Heights, the issue of the borders, the concerns of both sides are deep and real and serious,” he said.  

“That means there is a potential for these talks, and there is a potential for having better relationships on both sides, the Israeli side and the Syrian side, and that require both sides to start a long journey of negotiations between both of them, and to believe that a better relationship is possible between both of them.”

Ghassan Ibrahim, founder of the Global Arab Network, believes the real test for Al-Sharaa’s government will be reconstruction.

For post-Assad Syria to rebuild after years of conflict, interim President Ahmad Al-Sharaa must obtain full and permanent lifting of restrictions imposed by the US and other western economies. (AFP/File)

“The key now is how the government handles the opportunities it’s being given — politically, regionally, internationally, and with sanctions relief,” he told Arab News.

“Will reconstruction be piecemeal, with companies simply seizing contracts, or will it be comprehensive?”

The London-based Syria analyst added: “Ideally, reconstruction should create opportunities for businesses, rebuild infrastructure, improve quality of life, and promote stability — ultimately encouraging refugees to return.

“These are the things that will be judged moving forward.”