GAZA STRIP (Dispatches) – U.S. President Donald Trump’s so-called Board of Peace is directly funding rubble removal and road-paving operations across Gaza that are erasing evidence of Israel’s genocide and paving the way for the annexation and Jewish settlement of the strip.
Palestinian researcher and political writer Muhammad Shehada of the European Council on Foreign Relations reported that the board is “paying the expenses of the IDF [Israeli military]’s covert transfer of rubble (mixed with dead bodies) out of Gaza.”
“The money is taken from Gaza’s reconstruction funds,” Shehada highlighted. To date, only the U.S., Morocco, and the UAE have provided any actual funding to the highly controversial board.
EU diplomats reportedly informed Shehada that “Israel has been quietly moving hundreds of thousands of tons of rubble mixed with dead bodies out of Gaza to bury evidence of its genocide.”
“When the EU asked Israel why or whether they filter human remains out of the rubble, no answer ever came,” Shehada added.
Since the beginning of its genocide in Gaza, Israel has killed at least 73,000 Palestinians, the majority women and children. Thousands more remain buried under the rubble of their destroyed homes.
By removing the rubble before a search for victims can be carried out with heavy equipment, Palestinians will not know whether their relatives are dead or abducted by Israeli forces and held in its network of torture centers.
Shehada indicates that proof of the American board’s involvement in funding rubble removal is found in a tender document released on May 20, 2026, which sought contractors for “leveling & compacting” work in Gaza.
Shehada reports that an Israeli company, Terra Firma, has been clearing rubble in Gaza using heavy machinery designed to crush debris and process it into dust, including to help the Israeli military build roads, specifically near Erez.
As a result, the Board of Peace “is actively paying, compensating, subsidizing, and aiding Israeli companies, contractors, the Israeli army, and the Israeli government for these rubble-removal and road-paving operations,” the Gaza Herald writes.
“These operations systematically erase evidence of war crimes and desecrate human remains,” the Herald added, as no measures are taken to separate remains of victims from the debris or to preserve potential mass graves covered by the newly constructed roads.
At the same time, critical civilian infrastructure such as water networks, electricity systems, sewage facilities, hospitals, and bakeries remain deliberately unrepaired.
According to Dr. Ramy Abdu, a prominent Palestinian human rights advocate, the American board “acts as a structural cover for ongoing land seizures and displacement.”
The so-called Board of Peace was established in the wake of the October 2025 “ceasefire” backed by the U.S. Trump declared that the board would oversee Gaza’s reconstruction, allegedly for the benefit of Palestinians.
However, over the past 10 months, “Israeli forces have stepped up a systematic campaign of erasure in the area of Gaza directly under their control,” according to an investigation by the New Humanitarian.
“In this almost entirely depopulated zone, Israel has been tearing down whatever remains, setting fire to fields, and bulldozing towns and once-green agricultural communities into the ground,” the New Humanitarian found.