Nine months after Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged $100 million to ease the crisis in Gaza, Beijing has not said how much of it has been spent. When Sun Zhen, who heads China’s diplomatic office to the Palestinians, announced new aid at a Sept. 29 reception in Ramallah — urgent cash support for the Palestinian Authority and three more tranches through UNICEF, the U.N. Development Programme and the Egyptian Red Crescent — he gave no amounts but said the details are still being coordinated.
Palestinian Economy Minister Mohammed Al-Amour attended on behalf of President Mahmoud Abbas. The Chinese office’s English readout said only that Sun “outlined China’s assistance to Palestine.” The details came from Palestinian media.
Sun highlighted that China, working with UNICEF, has already delivered winter clothing and medical supplies to more than 38,000 children in Gaza and medicines to six health facilities. That is a small share of Gaza’s roughly 1.1 million children, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. China reported the Gaza deliveries by the number of people helped, not by cost, making a comparison between the $100 million pledge and other donors’ spending difficult.
The $100 million was always modest. In April 2025, the EU announced up to €1.6 billion ($1.8 billion) for the Palestinians over three years, including €620 million ($697 million) in grants to the Palestinian Authority.
All of that pales compared with Gaza’s immense need. A U.N. damage and needs assessment, released in April 2026, put the cost to rebuild and rehabilitate Gaza at $71.4 billion over the next decade.
China’s longer-term footprint is even smaller. MBN’s China Tracker monitors projects across the Middle East and North Africa under the Belt and Road Initiative, Beijing’s global infrastructure and investment program. It records four in the Palestinian territories since 2023, all in or near Ramallah: a Chinese school, a Friendship Square, an 11-kilometer extension of Beijing Road, and the Friendship and Development Building signed this September, which Chinese officials call their largest aid project in Palestine.
“China’s primary interests in Gaza are currently political and strategic rather than commercial,” Mordechai Chaziza, an associate professor at Ashkelon Academic College in Israel who studies China’s role in the Middle East, told MBN via email. “Beijing seeks to strengthen its image as a supporter of the Palestinian cause, reinforce its role as an alternative diplomatic actor in the Middle East, and challenge the perception that the United States is the only external power capable of shaping regional outcomes.”
That approach also shows in reconstruction, where China has stood alone. On Sept. 23, the U.S.-backed Board of Peace, chaired by U.S. President Donald Trump and set up to oversee Gaza’s postwar rebuilding, unveiled a $2.45 billion, six-month plan of 66 projects. The board’s high representative, Nikolay Mladenov, said the plan depends on Hamas disarming.
China was invited to join the board in January, but it has not said whether it will, saying only that it backs a U.N.-centered system. Staying outside “may limit China’s direct influence over reconstruction decisions,” Chaziza said. But working through Egypt, Arab states and Palestinian institutions lets Beijing keep influence “while avoiding the political and financial risks associated with leading the reconstruction process.”
China’s presence is most concrete in supplies. MBN confirmed in U.N. records that the Chinese company Haike was awarded a standing U.N. supply agreement in April 2025 for mobile homes in Gaza. The agreement sets no quantity or value, so it guarantees no sales. The Israeli business paper Globes reported that Haike won the contract with a bid 50 to 60 percent below the runner-up, and that a Chinese firm was among the lowest bidders on a later U.N. Development Programme contract for 45,000 homes. MBN could not independently verify the bid figures.
Chinese companies have the technical capacity and experience to take part in Gaza’s reconstruction, Chaziza said, but how big a role they play “will depend less on economic capability and more on political arrangements.”
If reconstruction runs through “Western-backed institutions with strict procurement conditions, Chinese firms may face limitations,” he said. If Arab states and international organizations take a more inclusive approach, Chinese companies “could become important participants.”
The test is what comes next: whether the cash and the three tranches arrive, at what value, who wins the Gaza contracts and whether Beijing ever engages with the Board of Peace.
“China’s goal is not to replace the United States in Gaza,” Chaziza said, “but to expand its political influence by presenting itself as a supporter of Palestinian rights, a partner of Arab states, and a potential contributor to reconstruction while protecting its broader regional interests.”
Houda Elboukili contributed reporting
