By Kanishk Singh
The US-led Peace Council will hold its first meeting of leaders on February 19WASHINGTON, – US President Donald Trump’s peace board will hold its first leaders’ meeting on February 19, a US government official confirmed on Saturday, without giving further details.
The planned meeting was first reported by Axios, which said the gathering would also serve as a fundraising conference for Gaza reconstruction.
“We can confirm that the Board of Peace meeting will take place on February 19,” the official said in a statement to Reuters. Further questions were referred to the White House, which did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The meeting will be held at the US Institute of Peace in Washington DC, Axios reported.
At least one world leader has confirmed his participation. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, one of Trump’s closest allies in the European Union, said at a campaign event in the western town of Szombathely on Saturday that he would travel to Washington in two weeks to attend a peace council meeting.
In late January, Trump launched the board that he will chair and that he says will aim to resolve global conflicts, leading some experts to worry that such a board could weaken the United Nations.
The Gaza ceasefire has been repeatedly violated
Governments around the world reacted cautiously to Trump’s invitation to join the initiative. While some of Washington’s Middle Eastern allies have joined in, many of its traditional Western allies have thus stayed away. Permanent membership on the board costs $1 billion.
A UN Security Council resolution, adopted in mid-November, authorized the board and countries working with it to establish an international stabilization force in Gaza, where a fragile cease-fire began in October under Trump’s plan signed by Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas.
Under Trump’s Gaza plan, which was released late last year, the board was intended to oversee the interim regime in Gaza. Then Trump said it would be extended to deal with global conflicts.
A spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the planned Peace Board meeting.
Many rights experts said Trump was overseeing a board to oversee the affairs of a foreign territory akin to a colonial structure and criticized the board for not including a Palestinian. The fragile cease-fire in Gaza has been repeatedly violated, with more than 550 Palestinians and four Israeli soldiers reportedly killed since the cease-fire began in October.
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