CENTCOM hosted a conference in Doha on Tuesday to try to get post-Gaza-War planning moving for the International Stabilization Force (ISF) after months of delays on the issue.
The ISF is one of the key components to the Israel-Hamas ceasefire, being the peace-enforcing or peacekeeping unit which is supposed to supervise the ceasefire, and potentially, replace Hamas in terms of maintaining public order in Gaza.
No concrete or final decisions were made at the conference and CENTCOM had not issued an official statement at press time.
For months, the main US contribution on the ground to the Israel-Hamas ceasefire has been the Civil-Military Coordination Center (CMCC), which to date has had success in strongly increasing humanitarian aid to Gazans, but little success in making progress on the ISF.
To date, the US has said that the ISF might include Egypt, the UAE, Indonesia, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, and others.
However, none of these countries to date have actually crossed the threshold of committing troops to the ISF, mainly with them claiming they would only do so if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu includes the Palestinian Authority in the mix, which he has refused to do.
However, Italy may now be volunteering peacekeepers for the ISF without attaching conditions regarding PA involvement.
Other countries might volunteer troops for ISF without PA involvement
Some sources told The Jerusalem Post that this may lead other parties to be more ready to volunteer peacekeeping forces, even if the PA is left out.
According to the sources, it was one thing for these other countries to refuse as long as no one broke the line, with an expectation that Israel would eventually blink and allow PA involvement.
But given Italy's position, source said that this calculation may shift.
On the other hand, both Israeli and US officials seem to have been overly optimistic to date about: 1) their capacity to convince Arab and other countries to contribute forces without PA involvement, as well as their capacity to secure Saudi normalization with Israel without a Palestinian state (the Saudis recently made it clear to US President Donald Trump that normalization is conditional on a Palestinian state.)
This could mean that even if Italy sends peacekeepers, and even if France, Malta, and others contribute some rumored additions, that the force might still remain down in the 5,000 range from the original 10,000-20,000 goal.
Further, it may remain without regional Arab representation, which could impact its legitimacy in Gaza.
There are also some countries who have suggested they would volunteer for a narrow mission, serving in areas where Hamas is not in control, and with limited rules of engagement so ensure their troops' safety.
It was unclear if the US would take up such offers as better than nothing or decline them as insufficient for taking over maintaining public order from Hamas.
Notably, Turkey was excluded from the Doha meeting due to Israel's objection over their hostility to the Jewish state, though Ankara has offered to send peacekeepers.
In that sense, US officials have indicated that the purpose of the Doha conference is to move closer to concrete commitments so that Trump can make an announcement during the upcoming holidays or around the start of 2026.
Also, on Tuesday, Wall reported that additional progress has been made toward clearing parts of Rafah for starting to rebuild new residential areas for the Gazans.
For some time now, Israel, the Saudis, and others have experimented with the idea of building up part of Rafah in the Israeli-controlled portion of Gaza for Palestinians to move to, so as to create a contrast between a new flourishing Gaza which cooperates with the world, and dilapidated Gaza ruled by Hamas.
On December 11, CMCC stated that "debris removal remains a complex challenge in Gaza, which CMCC staff are working to address. Current estimates suggest more than 60 million tons of debris are spread across the Gaza Strip."
"The coordination center’s engineering working group recently developed a map to better understand the scale and distribution of debris in different areas. The data-driven approach has enhanced international efforts for determining where to prioritize debris removal efforts," said CMCC.
In the meantime, Hamas has controlled the around 50% of Gaza where the entire Gazan population resides for around 10 weeks and counting.
On December 11, CENTCOM announced that the CMCC had achieved the milestone of facilitating movement for more than 30,000 trucks worth of humanitarian aid and commercial goods into Gaza.
Established on October 17, the CMCC had facilitated five consecutive weeks of at least 4,200 truckloads of aid and goods entering Gaza.
Nearly 20 internationally supported bakeries are now able to produce more than 160,000 loaves of bread daily. Additionally, hot meal kitchens currently provide an estimated 1.6 million meals daily – a 140% increase since September.
Additionally, the CMCC said its international staff expanded to include representatives from approximately 60 partner nations and organizations.
Despite this last CMCC statement, other reports have indicated that it has been primarily a US-Israeli effort and that many international parties have stopped working with the CMCC due to its inflexibility in various areas, including an unwillingness to work with the PA.