[🇧🇩] Israel and Hamas war in Gaza-----Can Bangladesh be a peace broker?

[Saif]

Thousands stage pro-Gaza rally in Istanbul

Thousands joined a New Year’s Day rally for Gaza in Istanbul Thursday, waving Palestinian and Turkish flags and calling for an end to the violence in the tiny war-torn territory...

www.newagebd.net

Thousands stage pro-Gaza rally in Istanbul
Agence France-Presse . Istanbul, Turkey 01 January, 2026, 22:01

People hold Turkish flags and Palestinain flags as they demonstrate in solidarity with the Palestinian people amid the on-going war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group in the Gaza enclave, at the Galata Bridge in Istanbul on Thursday. | AFP photo

Thousands joined a New Year’s Day rally for Gaza in Istanbul Thursday, waving Palestinian and Turkish flags and calling for an end to the violence in the tiny war-torn territory.

Demonstrators gathered in freezing temperatures under cloudless blue skies to march to the city’s Galata Bridge for a rally under the slogan: ‘We won’t remain silent, we won’t forget Palestine,’ an AFP reporter at the scene said.


More than 400 civil society organisations were present at the rally, one of whose organisers was Bilal Erdogan, the youngest son of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Police sources and Anadolou state news agency said some 5,00,000 people had joined the march at which there were speeches and a performance by Lebanese-born singer Maher Zain of his song ‘Free Palestine’.

‘We are praying that 2026 will bring goodness for our entire nation and for the oppressed Palestinians,’ said Erdogan, who chairs the board of the Ilim Yayma Foundation, an educational charity that was one of the organisers of the march.

Turkey has been one of the most vocal critics of the war in Gaza and helped broker a recent ceasefire that halted the deadly war waged by Israel in response to Hamas’s unprecedented attack on October 7, 2023.

But the fragile October 10 ceasefire has not stopped the violence with more than more than 400 Palestinians killed since it took hold.​

 

[Saif]

5 children among 13 killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli attacks in the Palestinian territory on Thursday killed at least 13 people, including five children, despite a ceasefire that has largely halted the fighting.

www.newagebd.net

5 children among 13 killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza
Agence France-Presse . Gaza City 10 January, 2026, 01:19

A Palestinian girl makes her way over debris in the Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip on Friday following Israeli attacks. | AFP photo

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli attacks in the Palestinian territory on Thursday killed at least 13 people, including five children, despite a ceasefire that has largely halted the fighting.

Four people, including three children, were killed when a drone struck a tent sheltering displaced people in southern Gaza, agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said.


In the north of the Gaza Strip, an 11-year-old girl was killed near the Jabalia refugee camp and a strike on a school killed one person, while a drone near Khan Yunis in the south killed a man, the agency added.

Two more Gazans, including a child, were killed in other attacks, reported the agency, which operates under Hamas authority.

Later on Thursday evening, four more people were killed in an Israeli air strike that targeted a house in an eastern area of Gaza City, Bassal said, adding that rescue work to search for several people who were missing had begun.

‘The death toll has risen to 13 as a result of Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip since this morning in a clear violation of the ceasefire agreement,’ Bassal said.

In a statement Friday morning, the Israeli military said it ‘precisely struck Hamas terrorists and terror infrastructure in the southern and northern Gaza Strip’ in response to a ‘failed projectile’ launch.

‘The projectile that was launched from the Gaza Strip constitutes a violation of the ceasefire agreement,’ the statement added.

Since October 10, a fragile US-sponsored truce in Gaza has largely halted the fighting between Israeli forces and Hamas, but both sides have alleged frequent violations.

Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem said that the strikes in Gaza on Thursday ‘confirm the Israeli occupation’s renunciation of its commitment to the ceasefire’.

Israeli forces have killed at least 425 Palestinians in Gaza since the ceasefire took effect, according to Gaza’s health ministry.

At least 21 people were killed on November 22 in Israeli strikes, making it one of the deadliest days in Gaza since the ceasefire came into effect.

The Israeli military said militants have killed three of its soldiers during the same period.

Meanwhile, Palestinian vice president Hussein al-Sheikh met on Friday with former UN Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov, who is expected to head the US‑backed Board of Peace in Gaza.

The meeting in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah comes a day after Mladenov held talks with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and met with president Isaac Herzog.

Bulgarian diplomat Mladenov served as the United Nations envoy for the Middle East peace process from early 2015 until the end of 2020.

Media reports say he is expected to serve as the representative on the ground in Gaza for the Board of Peace — a transitional body for the war-battered Palestinian territory which US President Donald Trump would theoretically chair.

In a statement on X, Sheikh said that during his meeting with Mladenov, ‘an in-depth discussion took place on all political and field developments in the Palestinian territories’.

He added there was ‘a focus on the situation in the Gaza Strip, means of transitioning to the second phase of the ceasefire, mechanisms for implementing the US president Donald Trump’s plan, and UN Security Council Resolution 2803’.​

 

[Saif]

Palestine Solidarity Committee urges govt not to join Gaza Stabilization Force

Says Bangladesh has always stood firmly in favour of Palestinians’ rights

www.thedailystar.net

Palestine Solidarity Committee urges govt not to join Gaza Stabilization Force

Says Bangladesh has always stood firmly in favour of Palestinians’ rights


By Star Online Report
​

​

Star file photo

Palestine Solidarity Committee, Bangladesh, today strongly condemned the interim government's interest, in principle, in joining the proposed International Stabilization Force for Gaza.


Expressing deep concerns, the organisation demanded an immediate withdrawal from this decision.


In a statement, Prof Md Harun-or-Rashid, member secretary of Palestine Solidarity Committee, Bangladesh, said the main responsibility of the Stabilization Force will be to disarm the freedom fighters in Gaza under the pretext of ensuring the security of Israel, and in turn, to completely eliminate the resistance movement of the Palestinian people.

“Unfortunately, the National Security Adviser of the interim government, Khalilur Rahman, who is currently visiting the US, has expressed Bangladesh's interest in participating in the International Stabilization Force for Gaza in a meeting with the US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Allison Hooker, and Assistant Secretary of State, Paul Kapur, in Washington,” it said, referring to a statement from the chief adviser’s press wing.


“It is important to remember that the people of Bangladesh have always stood firmly in favour of the rights and freedom of the Palestinian people,” it noted.​

 

[Saif]

100 children killed in Gaza since ceasefire: UN

At least 100 children have been killed by Israeli airstrikes and ground forces in Gaza since the start of a tenuous ceasefire three months ago, the United Nations said on Tuesday.

www.newagebd.net

100 children killed in Gaza since ceasefire: UN

Agence France-Presse . Geneva, Switzerland 14 January, 2026, 01:09

Palestinians stand next to makeshift shelters inside a war-damaged building, parts of which collapsed on a windy winter day in Gaza City on Tuesday. | AFP photo

At least 100 children have been killed by Israeli airstrikes and ground forces in Gaza since the start of a tenuous ceasefire three months ago, the United Nations said on Tuesday.

The UN children’s agency UNICEF said that at least 60 boys and 40 girls had been killed in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory since early October.


‘More than 100 children have been killed in Gaza since the ceasefire,’ UNICEF spokesman James Elder told reporters in Geneva.

‘That’s roughly a girl or a boy killed here every day during a ceasefire,’ he said, speaking from Gaza City.

‘These children are killed from airstrikes, drone strikes, including suicide drones. They’re killed from tank shelling. They’re killed from live ammunition. They’re killed from quad copters.

‘We are at 100 — no doubt,’ he said, adding that the true number was likely higher.

‘A ceasefire that slows the bombs is progress but one that still buries children is not enough.’

AFP has sought a response from the Israeli military.

An official at Gaza’s health ministry, which maintains casualty records, has reported a higher figure of 165 children killed during the tenuous ceasefire, out of a total 442 fatalities.

‘Additionally, seven children have died from exposure to cold since the beginning of this year,’ Zaher Al-Wahidi, Director of the Computer Department at the Ministry of Health, said.

Elder stressed that the on-going Israeli attacks came after more than two years of war which has ‘left life for Gaza’s children unimaginably hard’.

‘They still live in fear. The psychological damage remains untreated, and it’s becoming deeper and harder to heal the longer this goes on,’ he said.

In November, authorities in Gaza said more than 70,000 people had been killed there since the beginning of the war waged by Israel in response to Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.

Nearly 80 per cent of buildings in Gaza have been destroyed or damaged in the relentless air and ground offensive, according to UN data.

On January 1, Israel suspended 37 international aid agencies from accessing the Gaza Strip, despite what the UN said at the time was an ‘outrageous’ move.

‘Blocking international NGOs, blocking any humanitarian aid... that means blocking life-saving assistance,’ Elder stressed on Monday.

While UNICEF had managed to significantly increase aid entering the densely populated strip since October, he stressed: ‘You need partners on the ground, and it (the aid) still doesn’t meet the need.’

‘It’s impossible to overstate just how much still is required to be done here.’

He also insisted: ‘When you’ve got key NGOs banned from delivering humanitarian aid and from bearing witness, and when foreign journalists are barred’ it begs the question if the aim is ‘restricting scrutiny of suffering of children’.​

 

[Saif]

US expected to unveil post-war Gaza leadership, sources say

US President Donald Trump is expected on Wednesday to push ahead with his phased plan for Gaza's future by announcing the administration that will run the war-ravaged Palestinian territory, four Palestinian sources said. Israel and Hamas in October signed off on Trump's 20-point plan which says th

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

US expected to unveil post-war Gaza leadership, sources say

REUTERS
Published :
Jan 14, 2026 20:19
Updated :
Jan 14, 2026 20:19

Displaced Palestinians shelter at a tent camp in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Jan 14, 2026. Photo : REUTERS/Haseeb Alwazeer


US President Donald Trump is expected on Wednesday to push ahead with his phased plan for Gaza's future by announcing the administration that will run the war-ravaged Palestinian territory, four Palestinian sources said.

Israel and Hamas in October signed off on Trump's 20-point plan which says that a technocratic Palestinian body overseen by an international "Board of Peace" is meant to govern Gaza for a transitional period. It is not to include Hamas representation.

The 14-member Palestinian body will be headed by Ali Shaath, a former deputy minister in the Western-backed Palestinian Authority who had been in charge of developing industrial zones, the Palestinian sources said.

Other members tapped by Nickolay Mladenov, the former UN Middle East envoy who is expected to represent the Board of Peace on the ground, include people from the private sector and NGOS, according a list of the names obtained by Reuters.

TRUMP MOVING TO PHASE TWO OF GAZA PLAN DESPITE ISSUES

The first phase of Trump's plan, which included a ceasefire and hostage release deal, has been shaken by issues including Israeli airstrikes in Gaza that have killed hundreds of people, a refusal by Hamas to disarm, the remains of one last Israeli hostage still not having been returned and Israeli delays in reopening Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt.

Although the two sides accuse each other of breaching the deal, Trump says he wants to move on to the second phase, a progression that would entail the establishment of the Board of Peace and a yet-to-be-agreed deployment of peacekeeping forces.

Hamas leaders and other Palestinian factions are in Cairo for talks on the second phase, the group said. Egyptian sources said talks with Hamas would now focus on the group's disarmament.

Hamas has so far not agreed to lay down its weapons, saying it will only give up its weapons once there is a Palestinian state. Further Israeli withdrawals within Gaza are tied to disarmament.

Members of the technocratic Palestinian committee were expected to meet with Mladenov in Cairo on Wednesday. Hamas and its rival Fatah group, led by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, have both endorsed the list of members, Egyptian and Palestinian sources said.

It will also include the head of the Gaza Chamber of Commerce Ayed Abu Ramadan and Omar Shamali, who has worked for the Palestinian Telecommunication Group PALTEL, the Palestinian sources said.

Israeli officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.​

 

[Saif]

Gaza ceasefire enters phase 2 despite unresolved issues

A US-backed plan to end the war in Gaza has entered its second phase despite unresolved disputes between Israel and Hamas over alleged ceasefire violations and issues unaddressed in the first stage.

www.newagebd.net

Gaza ceasefire enters phase 2 despite unresolved issues
Agence France-Presse . Jerusalem, Undefined 17 January, 2026, 01:39

Palestinians survey the destruction of a house after an Israeli military attack on the home of the al-Houli family, in which four people were reportedly killed, west of Deir al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip on Friday. | AFP photo

A US-backed plan to end the war in Gaza has entered its second phase despite unresolved disputes between Israel and Hamas over alleged ceasefire violations and issues unaddressed in the first stage.

The most contentious questions remain Hamas’s refusal to publicly commit to full disarmament, a non-negotiable demand from Israel, and Israel’s lack of clarity over whether it will fully withdraw its forces from Gaza.

The creation of a Palestinian technocratic committee, announced on Wednesday, is intended to manage day-to-day governance in post-war Gaza, but it leaves unresolved broader political and security questions.

Below is a breakdown of developments from phase one to the newly launched second stage.

The first phase of the plan, part of a 20-point proposal unveiled by US president Donald Trump, began on October 10 and aimed primarily to stop the fighting in the Gaza Strip, allow in aid and secure the return of all remaining living and deceased hostages held by Hamas and allied Palestinian militant groups.

All hostages have since been returned, except for the remains of one Israeli, Ran Gvili.

Israel has accused Hamas of delaying the handover of Gvili’s body, while Hamas has said widespread destruction in Gaza made locating the remains difficult.

Gvili’s family had urged mediators to delay the transition to phase two.

‘Moving on breaks my heart. Have we given up? Ran did not give up on anyone,’ his sister, Shira Gvili, said after mediators announced the move.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said efforts to recover Gvili’s remains would continue but has not publicly commented on the launch of phase two.

Hamas has accused Israel of repeated ceasefire violations, including air strikes, firing on civilians and advancing the so-called ‘Yellow Line,’ an informal boundary separating areas under Israeli military control from those under Hamas authority.

Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry said Israeli forces had killed 451 people since the ceasefire took effect.

Israel’s military said it had targeted suspected militants who crossed into restricted zones near the Yellow Line, adding that three Israeli soldiers were also killed by militants during the same period.

Aid agencies say Israel has not allowed the volume of humanitarian assistance envisaged under phase one, a claim Israel rejects.

Gaza, whose borders and access points remain under Israeli control, continues to face severe shortages of food, clean water, medicine and fuel.

Israel and the United Nations have repeatedly disputed figures on the number of aid trucks permitted to enter the Palestinian territory.

Under the second phase, Gaza is to be administered by a 15-member Palestinian technocratic committee operating under the supervision of a so-called ‘Board of Peace,’ to be chaired by Trump.

‘The ball is now in the court of the mediators, the American guarantor and the international community to empower the committee,’ Bassem Naim, a senior Hamas leader, said in a statement on Thursday.

Trump on Thursday announced the board of peace had been formed and its members would be announced ‘shortly’.

Mediators Egypt, Turkey and Qatar said Ali Shaath, a former deputy minister in the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority, had been appointed to lead the committee.

Later on Thursday, Egyptian state television reported that all members of the committee had ‘arrived in Egypt and begun their meetings in preparation for entering the territory’.

Al-Qahera News, which is close to Egypt’s state intelligence services, said the members’ arrival followed US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff’s announcement on Wednesday ‘of the start of the second phase and what was agreed upon at the meeting of Palestinian factions in Cairo yesterday’.

Shaath, in a recent interview, said the committee would rely on ‘brains rather than weapons’ and would not coordinate with armed groups.

On Wednesday, Witkoff said phase two aims for the ‘full demilitarisation and reconstruction of Gaza,’ including the disarmament of all unauthorised armed factions.

Witkoff said Washington expected Hamas to fulfil its remaining obligations, including the return of Gvili’s body, warning that failure to do so would bring ‘serious consequences’.

The plan also calls for the deployment of an International Stabilisation Force to help secure Gaza and train vetted Palestinian police units.

For Palestinians, the central issue remains Israel’s full military withdrawal from Gaza — a step included in the framework but for which no detailed timetable has been announced.

With fundamental disagreements persisting over disarmament, withdrawal and governance, diplomats say the success of phase two will depend on sustained pressure from mediators and whether both sides are willing — or able — to move beyond long-standing red lines.​

 

[Saif]

Trump invites more leaders to Gaza ‘Board of Peace’

US president Donald Trump’s so-called ‘Board of Peace’ for postwar Gaza began to take shape Saturday, with the leaders of Egypt, Turkey, Argentina and Canada asked to join.

www.newagebd.net

Trump invites more leaders to Gaza ‘Board of Peace’
Agence France-Presse . Washington 18 January, 2026, 01:11

US president Donald Trump.

US president Donald Trump’s so-called ‘Board of Peace’ for postwar Gaza began to take shape Saturday, with the leaders of Egypt, Turkey, Argentina and Canada asked to join.

The announcements from those leaders came after the US president named his Secretary of State Marco Rubio, former British prime minister Tony Blair, and senior negotiators Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff to the panel.

Trump had already declared himself the chair of the body, as he promotes a controversial vision of economic development in the Palestinian territory, which lies in rubble after two-plus years of relentless Israeli bombardment.

The moves came after a Palestinian committee of technocrats meant to govern Gaza held its first meeting in Cairo which was attended by Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law who has partnered with Witkoff for months on the issue.

In Canada, a senior aide to prime minister Mark Carney said he intended to accept Trump’s invitation, while in Turkey, a spokesman for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he had been asked to become a ‘founding member’ of the board.

Egypt’s foreign minister Badr Abdelatty said Cairo was ‘studying’ a request for President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to join.

Sharing an image of the invitation letter, Argentine president Javier Milei wrote on X that it would be ‘an honour’ to participate in the initiative.

In a statement sent to AFP, Blair said: ‘I thank President Trump for his leadership in establishing the Board of Peace and am honoured to be appointed to its Executive Board.’

Blair is a controversial figure in the Middle East because of his role in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Trump himself said last year that he wanted to make sure Blair was an ‘acceptable choice to everybody.’

Blair spent years focused on the Israeli-Palestinian issue as representative of the ‘Middle East Quartet’—the United Nations, European Union, United States and Russia—after leaving Downing Street in 2007.

The White House said the Board of Peace will take on issues such as ‘governance capacity-building, regional relations, reconstruction, investment attraction, large-scale funding and capital mobilization.’

The other members of the board so far are World Bank president Ajay Banga, an Indian-born American businessman; billionaire US financier Marc Rowan; and Robert Gabriel, a loyal Trump aide who serves on the US National Security Council.

Trump has created a second ‘Gaza executive board’ that appears designed to have a more advisory role.

It was not immediately clear which world leaders were asked to be on each board.

The White House, which said Friday that additional members would be named to both entities, did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Washington has said the Gaza plan had gone on to a second phase—from implementing the ceasefire to disarming Hamas, whose October 2023 attack on Israel prompted the massive Israeli offensive.

On Friday, Trump named US Major General Jasper Jeffers to head the International Stabilization Force, which will be tasked with providing security in Gaza and training a new police force to succeed Hamas.

Jeffers, from special operations in US Central Command, in late 2024 was put in charge of monitoring a ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel, which has continued periodic strikes aimed at Hezbollah militants.

Gaza native and former Palestinian Authority deputy minister Ali Shaath was earlier tapped to head the governing committee.

Trump, a real estate developer, has previously mused about turning devastated Gaza into a Riviera-style area of resorts, although he has backed away from calls to forcibly displace the population.​

 

[Saif]

Dangerous illusion of ‘stabilisation’

THE recent protests organised by the Palestine Solidarity Committee in Bangladesh reflect a deep moral and political clarity that resonates with the conscience of the Bangladeshis. At a time when Gaza continues to suffer unprecedented destruction, displacement, and collective punishment, the...

www.newagebd.net

Dangerous illusion of ‘stabilisation’

THE recent protests organised by the Palestine Solidarity Committee in Bangladesh reflect a deep moral and political clarity that resonates with the conscience of the Bangladeshis. At a time when Gaza continues to suffer unprecedented destruction, displacement, and collective punishment, the PSC’s rejection of Bangladesh’s possible involvement in a proposed Gaza International Stabilisation Force is not only justified, but it is necessary.

The so-called International Stabilisation Force, as currently envisioned, is not a peacekeeping or humanitarian mission in any genuine sense. Rather, it is a security mechanism designed primarily to serve Israeli strategic interests under the language of ‘stabilisation’ and ‘demilitarisation’. Its core objective is clear: to disarm Palestinian resistance forces in Gaza under the pretext of ensuring Israeli security, thereby eliminating the very means through which Palestinians resist occupation, siege, and apartheid.

Force without Palestinians

ONE of the most alarming aspects of the proposed International Stabilisation Force is that it was developed without consultation with any Palestinian political actors or representative bodies. Neither Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, nor broader Palestinian civil society was meaningfully involved. This exclusion alone exposes the initiative for what it is: a top-down, imperial project imposed on an occupied people.

The ‘comprehensive plan’ promoted during Donald Trump’s political campaign, and echoed in subsequent policy discussions, reflects a long-standing pattern of US imperial hegemony. Decisions about Palestinian land, security, governance, and resistance are once again being made in Washington, Tel Aviv, and allied capitals, not in Gaza or Ramallah. Any security arrangement that excludes Palestinians while claiming to act in their interest is fundamentally illegitimate.

The International Stabilisation Force’s mandate reportedly includes training a new Palestinian police force that would not be accountable to Hamas or the Palestinian Authority, cooperating closely with Israel and Egypt, maintaining border security, securing humanitarian corridors, and enforcing the ‘demilitarisation’ of Gaza. In practice, this means creating a locally recruited force whose primary role would be to police Palestinians on behalf of external powers. History, from Iraq to Afghanistan, shows that such arrangements collapse into repression, dependency, and resistance.

Why Bangladesh must not participate

BANGLADESH’S strength on the global stage has long rested on moral consistency: opposition to colonialism, support for self-determination, and solidarity with oppressed peoples. Joining an international stabilisation force whose explicit or implicit mission is to neutralise Palestinian resistance would represent a profound betrayal of these principles.

Palestinian resistance, regardless of how one evaluates its tactics, emerges from decades of occupation, blockade, dispossession, and denial of political rights. To participate in a force aimed at disarming Gaza while the occupation continues, settlements expand, and accountability remains absent is to side with power against justice.

The PSC protests correctly warn that Bangladeshi soldiers should never be placed in a position where they are expected to suppress an occupied population in coordination with its occupier. Such a role would not only stain Bangladesh’s international standing but also contradict the country’s own liberation history.

Irony and pro-Israel objections

ADDING a layer of irony to this debate are recent statements by Moshe Phillips, national president of Americans For A Safe Israel, who criticised Bangladesh as fundamentally unfit to participate in any Gaza stabilisation force due to its ‘lack of neutrality.’ Phillips argues that Bangladesh’s consistent pro-Palestinian positions — its non-recognition of Israel, trade restrictions, voting record at the UN, and legal accusations against Israel — disqualify it from peacekeeping.

In effect, a leading pro-Israel advocate is openly stating that Bangladesh should be excluded because it refuses to abandon its principled stance on Palestinian rights. From one perspective, this critique exposes the true nature of the International Stabilisation Force: neutrality is defined not as adherence to international law or human rights, but as acceptance of Israeli narratives and security priorities.

If neutrality means ignoring occupation, apartheid, and collective punishment, then Bangladesh should proudly reject such a definition. The fact that pro-Israel organisations are warning Washington against Bangladeshi participation only reinforces the PSC’s argument: Bangladesh should not offer unsolicited assistance to a project that is structurally biased and morally compromised.

Human rights, selective morality, and pressure politics

BANGLADESH has also been targeted by repeated US human rights reports that portray the country in a consistently negative light. While no state is beyond criticism, these reports often function as political instruments—used selectively to pressure governments that do not align with US strategic interests. The same moral scrutiny is rarely applied with equal force to Israel, despite overwhelming documentation of war crimes and violations in Gaza.

This pattern should concern Bangladesh deeply. Human rights discourse, when weaponised, becomes a gateway for interference in internal affairs, coercive diplomacy, and conditional engagement. Participation in the International Stabilisation Force could further entangle Bangladesh in a framework where its sovereignty and policy independence are compromised.

Call for vigilance, principle

THE PSC protests articulate a simple but powerful message: Bangladesh must stand with the oppressed, not police them. The people of Bangladesh have consistently supported Palestinian rights because they recognise a familiar struggle — for dignity, freedom, and self-determination.

True peace in Gaza cannot be imposed by foreign forces cooperating with an occupying power. It cannot emerge from demilitarisation without de-occupation or security without justice. Any initiative that ignores these realities is not stabilization — it is pacification.

Bangladesh should therefore make its position unequivocally clear: it will not participate in any force designed to dismantle Palestinian resistance while leaving the structures of oppression intact. In doing so, Bangladesh would not be acting irresponsibly or ideologically but in line with international law, historical experience, and its own national values.

At this critical moment, vigilance is not optional. It is a duty.

Nazifa Jannat is a journalism student at Syracuse University.​