Newsletters
The Board of Peace, the body set up in January under Donald Trump to oversee Gaza's reconstruction, has issued its first construction contract in the territory, a modest project to build a 150-person military outpost for Moroccan troops, according to a source familiar with the matter who spoke to the Guardian.
The contract, which has not yet been finalized, was awarded to Arkel International, a Louisiana-based construction firm that has previously worked with the US government on projects in countries including Iraq.
The base is planned to measure just 100 meters by 120 meters and would house a rotating contingent of Moroccan troops stationed roughly a mile from the Israeli border, inside the roughly 60% of Gaza that Israeli forces directly control.
The site would also include a "quick extraction route" allowing the small force to withdraw if it came under attack, the source said.
The award represents a significant scaling back of the board's original ambitions. The Guardian reported in July that the reconstruction effort had already shrunk from a sweeping plan to rebuild the entire territory into a small pilot project confined to southern Gaza.
Earlier contract documents reviewed by the Guardian described the 150-person outpost as merely the first phase of a larger plan to eventually build a 5,000-person base for an international stabilization force, complete with vehicle fighting positions and a perimeter berm. For now, those documents said, the facilities would be rudimentary, consisting of tents, cots, chemical toilets and handwashing stations, what planners called the minimum standard "we would consider habitable."
A Board of Peace official, responding by email, said the board and the Palestinian technocratic body overseeing Gaza, known as the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, "are in the final stages of preparing several contract awards," adding that "none have been finalized."
The official said the prospective Arkel contract "concerns facilities to support the international stabilisation force (ISF), which will assist in implementing the roadmap's security and governance arrangements," and called it "one of many that are essential for the future of Gaza."
The Board of Peace is chaired by Trump and includes his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and his longtime associate Steve Witkoff.
The United Nations resolution that authorized the Board of Peace also approved the creation of an international stabilization force for Gaza, though reports on which countries would contribute troops have varied.
Morocco has pledged a small contingent, but the legal framework governing the force has not been finalized, and no timeline has been set for its deployment.
The contract award comes days after Trump announced that Hamas had agreed to disarm, a claim that has raised questions about how the group would actually surrender its weapons.
Israel has publicly opposed the disarmament plan and has intensified airstrikes in Gaza since Trump's announcement.
The scaled-down project stands in sharp contrast to the vision Trump and Kushner presented earlier this year.
In February 2025, Trump said the United States would "take over" and "own" Gaza, though the agreement that ultimately established the Board of Peace stopped short of that plan.
At the board's first meeting in January, Kushner unveiled a "master plan" for what he described as "New Gaza," an expansive waterfront city featuring mixed-use towers. "It could be a hope, it could be a destination. A lot of industry," he said at the time.
The gap between that vision and the current reality remains stark. At least 80% of Gaza's buildings were damaged or destroyed during the war, and ten months after the ceasefire took effect, most of the territory's roughly 2 million residents are still living in makeshift, unsanitary camps.
Set as preferred source
Set as preferred source
1 min read
1 min read
