“Starting today, after the Cairo meeting, we will move to Gaza and begin providing relief to our people,” said Ali Shaath, the head of the newly formed Palestinian technocratic body tasked with administering post-war Gaza, in an exclusive interview with Al-Qahera News on friday after the committee held its first meeting in the Egyptian capital.
He described the committee as composed of “moderate Palestinian professional figures” focused on governance rather than factional politics.
“All of us on the committee have committed to building a Palestinian national economy,” Shaath said.
He added that the committee will work according to a plan that has received broad regional and international backing.
“The plan is based on the Egyptian one, which has been approved by the Arab League, endorsed by the Islamic world, and welcomed by the European Union,” he said.
According to mediators Egypt, Qatar, and Türkiye, the 15-member committee is headed by Shaath, a former Palestinian Authority deputy minister who previously oversaw the development of industrial zones.
Shaath, 68, a Gaza native and former Palestinian Authority deputy minister, will head the new technocratic committee set to administer the Gaza Strip, the mediating countries announced on Wednesday.
He was born in the southern city of Khan Younis in 1958, later leaving to study in Egypt.
Shaath hails from a prominent family and clan with a record of political engagement, with many of its members affiliated with the Fatah party.
He holds a PhD in Civil Engineering with a specialization in infrastructure and urban development from Queen’s University Belfast in the UK, as well as earlier degrees from Ain Shams University in Cairo, Egypt.
Shaath previously served as the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority’s deputy minister of planning and international cooperation, as well as undersecretary for the ministry of transportation and communications, among other portfolios.
On Thursday, Diaa Rashwan, head of Egypt’s State Information Service (SIS), stated in an interview with Saudi TV channel Al Arabiya that the technocratic committee would assume “full administrative, executive, local service and security-related responsibilities” as part of the second phase of the ceasefire.
Rashwan said the Sharm El-Sheikh Agreement, brokered by Egypt, Qatar, Türkiye and the US on 11 October, stipulates the formation of the committee, which would be composed of “independent technocrats not affiliated with any Palestinian faction,” whether in Gaza, the West Bank, or elsewhere.
On 11 October, Israel and Hamas signed onto Trump’s plan, which stipulates a truce in the Gaza war and an understanding that the strip would be administered during a transitional period by a Palestinian technocratic body overseen by an international “Board of Peace.”
Despite the truce, Israeli strikes have killed more than 451 Palestinians and wounded hundreds of others in the last three months, raising the number of those killed since the start of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023 to 71,441 people and the wounded to 171,329, mostly women and children.
The second phase in the truce between Israel and Hamas focuses on technocratic governance and the reconstruction of Gaza, while the Israeli demand for a "demilitarized Gaza" remains a key sticking point.
Rashwan added that while the technocrat committee’s mandate includes security-related roles, those responsibilities would be constrained by realities on the ground.
“Security is normally a police responsibility,” Rashwan said, adding that "around 58 percent of Gaza remains under Israeli occupation and therefore falls outside the committee’s jurisdiction."
