Trump wants this businessman to run post-war Gaza, but there’s a catch

Samir Halilah said he would only agree if given permission by the Palestinian Authority, which has rejected the idea.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

A Palestinian businessman in Canada said Tuesday that the Americans would like him to lead a post-war Gazan administration.

In an interview with Israeli Arabic station Nas Radio, Samir Halilah said that the Trump administration contacted him “because I am politically independent and unaffiliated with Fatah,” the main Palestinian movement behind the Palestinian Authority (PA).

The Jericho-born Halilah is still closely tied to the authority, however.

He served as an assistant undersecretary of the Ministry of Economy and Trade in the 1990s.

He then rose to become secretary-general of Ahmed Qurei’s third government in 2005, “where he spearheaded initiatives from the Prime Minister’s Office,” according to media site All4palestine.

The 57-year-old official also served for years in leadership roles in real estate companies closely tied to the Abbas regime, the site noted, and was elected chairman of the board of the Palestine Stock Exchange in 2022.

Halilah said that he had been approached more than a year ago and told the contacts that he would only take the job on “with the approval of the Palestinian Authority and donors.”

Calling himself “a son of the Palestinian Authority” in a statement to Sky News Arabia, he stressed that President Abbas, Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa, and “other parties” connected to the PA had been involved in “intensive consultations” about the idea.

Hamas has “no problem with an independent administrative committee taking over after the war,” he said, since it had already agreed not to be an official part of a post-war government.

In contrast, the Arabic-language Jaffa News Network cited a “senior official in the Palestinian presidency” as rejecting any thought of PA agreement regarding Halilah’s possible new role and condemning his statements.

He called on Halilah to “stop spreading falsehoods and attempting to cover up his disgraceful stance,” which he said was meant to “circumvent the official position” of the PA “that firmly rejects any Israeli project seeking to separate the Gaza Strip from the West Bank.”

According to a report in the Egypt Independent, a source in the presidency told Palestinian news agency Wafa that “the State of Palestine” was the only entity that would administer Gaza, “headed by a government minister.”

This could mean that it is Halilah’s ostensible claim to leadership that angered the PA.

Halilah’s ideas for the Gaza Strip’s future include the adoption of Egypt’s $53 billion reconstruction plan for Gaza, which was announced in March.

The Egyptians said at the time that they had worked with the Palestinians on who should participate in the management of the Strip, with all agreeing that they would be independent, professional Palestinian technocrats.

Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty had noted that the names of the individuals participating in the committee had been decided.