Cairo: The United States is promising $212 million in immediate assistance to the Palestinians as part of an international effort to rebuild the Gaza Strip after this summer's 50-day war.
US Secretary of State John Kerry says people in Gaza "need our help desperately - not tomorrow, not next week, but they need it now."
He announced the new money at a donor conference for the Palestinians in Cairo. The Palestinians are seeking $4 billion in international aid. UN chief Ban Ki-moon warned an international donor conference for Gaza on Sunday that the Palestinian enclave remained a "tinderbox" after a devastating war over the summer.
"Gaza remains a tinderbox, the people desperately need to see results in their daily lives," Ban said. Global envoys gathered in Cairo on Sunday in a bid to raise billions for the devastated Gaza Strip and to renew calls for Israel and the Palestinians to revive stalled peace efforts.
Some diplomats will also press Israel and the Palestinians to go back to the negotiating table, amid widespread concern that any aid to Gaza will eventually be lost in the enclave's cycle of violence. Opening the conference, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi put the onus on Israel to end its decades-old conflict with the Palestinians.
"I call on the Israeli people and the government: now is the time to end the conflict... so that prosperity prevails, so that we all can have peace and security," Sisi said in his opening remarks.
The Palestinian government unveiled a 76-page reconstruction plan ahead of the conference, calling for $4 billion in aid, with the lion's share to build housing. Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas told the conference the enclave's need was desperate.
"Gaza has suffered three wars in six years. Entire neighbourhoods have been destroyed... There is a tangible need for funds to bring back government institutions, because they have all been destroyed," Abbas said.
Kerry was to address the conference later and meet Abbas to press for renewed negotiations with Israel.
- 'Considerable donor fatigue' -
"I think it's very fair to say that there are serious questions being raised by a lot of the donors about... how best to break this cycle" of violence, a senior State Department official told reporters before Kerry left Washington.
There has to be reflection about "how best to ensure that we're not going to find ourselves back here doing the same thing again in a year or two".
This summer's conflict killed nearly 2,200 Palestinians, mostly civilians, while attacks by Gaza militants killed 73 on the Israeli side, mostly soldiers. It also left the densely populated enclave in ruins, displacing more than a quarter of Gaza's population of 1.7 million and leaving 100,000 people homeless.
