Israel approves international stabilisation force for Gaza

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Israel's political-security cabinet approved on Sunday the entry of the Board of Peace's International Stabilization Force into the parts of Gaza that lie outside Israeli military control, the first concrete legal step toward deploying the force since the ceasefire of October 2025. The initial contingent is reported at around 200 personnel drawn from countries such as Morocco and Uganda, with Israel keeping a veto over which states may take part. The timing places the decision a day before Prime Minister Netanyahu's departure for Washington and a meeting with President Trump scheduled for Tuesday, giving the approval the character of a card carried into those talks as much as an operational milestone. The move unlocks a plan that had stalled after its opening phase. Israeli hostages and Palestinian detainees were exchanged, but the technocratic National Committee for the Administration of Gaza remains outside the territory and has still not received Israeli permission to enter, leaving the civil-administration half of the arrangement untouched by Sunday's decision. On the ground the map has kept shifting in Israel's favour: Reuters estimates current Israeli control at about 64 per cent of Gaza and Al Jazeera at close to 70 per cent, while Israel has stated its intention to expand to 70 per cent. Almost all of the roughly two million residents live in a coastal strip under Hamas control, largely in tents or damaged buildings, which means the force is being authorised for the areas Israel holds rather than for the space where the population is concentrated.

The topic follows the international stabilisation force envisaged for Gaza under the framework overseen by the so-called Board of Peace, the body attached to the ceasefire that took effect in October 2025. That agreement was structured in phases: the first delivered an exchange of Israeli hostages and Palestinian detainees, while later steps were to bring in an outside security force and a technocratic National Committee for the Administration of Gaza to run civil affairs. Both of those later elements had been blocked, with the committee still unable to enter the territory for lack of Israeli permission. In parallel Israel has continued to advance the "yellow line" that marks the limit of its military control, now estimated at roughly 64 to 70 per cent of the Strip depending on the source. The practical question running through the topic is whether an externally staffed force, deployed only where Israel is not present and only with states Israel accepts, can develop into the transitional security arrangement the ceasefire plan describes.