Arab leaders try to hash out Gaza plan

Gaza Strip in ruins after more than 15 months of war

RIYADH:

Arab leaders met in Riyadh on Friday to craft a plan for Gaza's post-war reconstruction to counter Donald Trump's proposal for the United States to take over the territory without its Palestinian inhabitants.

Trump's plan has united Arab states in opposition to it, but disagreements remain over who should govern Gaza and how its reconstruction can be funded.

An image published on Saudi state television showed the kingdom's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman with the leaders of other Gulf Arab states, Egypt and Jordan.

A source close to the Saudi government confirmed the meeting had finished but the hosts did not immediately publish a final statement.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's office said he had left the Saudi capital after the meeting with the leaders of Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

A Saudi source had earlier told AFP that the Palestinian Authority, Hamas's West Bank-based rival, was also expected to take part in the talks.

Trump triggered global outrage when he proposed the United States "take over" the Gaza Strip and relocate its more than two million residents to Egypt and Jordan.

"We're at a very important historic juncture in the Arab-Israeli or Israeli-Palestinian conflict... where potentially the United States under Trump could create new facts on the ground that are irreversible," Andreas Krieg of King's College London said ahead of the meeting.

The Saudi source had told AFP that the summit participants would discuss "a reconstruction plan to counter Trump's plan for Gaza".