Global envoys including US Secretary of State John Kerry gathered in Cairo Sunday in a bid to raise billions to rebuild the devastated Gaza Strip after its summer war with Israel.

Kerry will lend US backing to efforts to raise up to $4 billion (3.2 billion euros) to assist Gaza after the enclave was battered by its 50-day conflict with Israel in July and August.

Palestinian children play inside a heavily damaged room in a partially destroyed building in al-Tufah, east of Gaza City on October 11. AFP Photo

The top US diplomat will also urge Israel and the Palestinians to revive peace talks, amid widespread concern that any aid to Gaza will eventually be lost in the enclave’s cycle of violence.

“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,” 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”.

A building destroyed by Israel in Gaza. Over 100,000 rendered homeless. AFP

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.

The Palestinian government has unveiled a 76-page reconstruction plan ahead of the conference, also attended by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

Palestinian children sit on the unfinished window of a damaged building by Israeli forces. AFP

The Palestinians have called for $4 billion in aid, with the lion’s share to build housing. The UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA has described Gaza’s financial needs as “unprecedented”.

– ‘Considerable donor fatigue’ –

It is unclear how generous the world will be, given the intractability of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and other priorities in the region, such as the fight against Islamic State jihadists in Syria and Iraq.

This summer’s war was the third conflict in the Palestinian coastal enclave in six years and diplomats say there is resistance to providing funds that may eventually go to waste.

“We have seen infrastructure projects that we have contributed to which have been destroyed,” one Western diplomat in Jerusalem said, adding that there was “considerable donor fatigue”.

AFP