Agencies Baghdad

Arab leaders meeting at an annual summit in Baghdad said Saturday that they were trying to reach a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and promised to contribute to the reconstruction of the territory once the war stops. In March, an emergency Arab League summit in Cairo endorsed a plan for Gaza's reconstruction without displacing its roughly 2 million residents.

The summit in Baghdad was attended by Arab leaders including Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and Egypt's President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi. Among the guests were Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who called for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza and the flow of aid into the besieged territory. He said that the UN rejects any "forced displacement" of Palestinians.

Saturday's summit comes two months after Israel ended a ceasefire reached with the Hamas militant group in January. In recent days, Israel has launched widespread attacks in Gaza and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed a further escalation to pursue his aim of destroying Hamas. "This genocide has reached levels of ugliness not seen in all conflicts throughout history," Iraq's Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said in a speech that called for allowing aid to flow into Gaza. 

Al-Sudani added that Iraq will work on setting up an Arab fund for the reconstruction of the region in which Baghdad will pay USD 20 million for Gaza and a similar amount for Lebanon.