Banga’s decision to join US-led Board of Peace raises questions about World Bank’s commitment to multilateralism
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Article summary
- Board of Peace charter fails to mention Palestinians and goes beyond UN Security Council-mandated scope.
- Widespread concerns that Board may undermine UN’s role and international law, with Bank’s European member states by-and-large declining to join.
- Civil society condemns Banga’s involvement and Bank’s role as trustee of Gaza Reconstruction and Development Fund.
In January, World Bank President Ajay Banga was announced as a member of the US-led Board of Peace’s executive board – in a move that has drawn condemnation from civil society.
As a February article in Devex noted, the executive board guides the Board of Peace’s operational work, with Banga serving “alongside U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Jared Kushner, [US] Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair,” among others.
The Board of Peace also includes a separate political board composed of heads of state, and an Executive Board of Gaza. A further National Committee for the Administration of the Gaza Strip, made up of 12 Palestinian “technocrats” – the lone part of the Board with any Palestinian representation – “is limited to managing day-to-day affairs…[and] currently has no real means of action,” according to the France-based Institute for International and Strategic Affairs.
Per reporting from Politico in January, “[US President Donald] Trump, as the board’s chairman, would be able to approve the participation of members, choose his own successor and veto decisions taken by a majority of members.” Politico quoted France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, who said, “This is very, very far from the Charter of the United Nations.”
The World Bank will also host the Gaza Reconstruction and Development Fund, which Banga confirmed will manage financial contributions to the Board of Peace, at a meeting on 19 February, where the US announced a $10 billion pledge. The Bank manages dozens of such trust funds, and typically charges significant administrative fees for hosting them (see Observer Winter 2023).
A February letter signed by 16 civil society organisations, including US-based Accountability Counsel and Germany-based Urgewald, described the Board of Peace as “an illegitimate and neo-colonial project” that seeks to profit from an undemocratic reconstruction of Gaza, and condemned the Bank’s involvement, stating, “We are deeply concerned by the risks to Palestinian people posed by this World Bank-enabled undertaking.”
The US’s plans for Gaza reconstruction closely mirror the AI-generated vision shared by Trump before the Gaza ceasefire: a special economic zone to promote real estate development – a so-called Gaza Riveria – where the voice of Gazans will be severely limited.
The prospects for Gaza reconstruction, more generally, are increasingly uncertain following the US and Israel’s attack on Iran on 28 February, and subsequent retaliation by Iran against US allies across the Persian Gulf, with the Financial Times reporting on 5 March that Gulf countries were reconsidering their support for the Board of Peace in light of the conflict.
Undermining the UN?
The Board of Peace derives its mandate from UN Security Council resolution 2803, passed in November 2025, which endorsed the “Comprehensive Plan of President Donald J. Trump to End the Conflict in Gaza.” However, Trump, who is named chairman for life in the Board’s charter, has repeatedly stated that the Board may seek to resolve other conflicts, going beyond the Security Council mandate.
In a speech at the Munich Security Conference in February, Rubio argued, “we cannot ignore that today, on the most urgent matters, it [the UN] has no answers and has played no role.”
This ignores the US’s role in undermining the effectiveness of the UN: the US has vetoed a total of 50 Security Council resolutions critical of Israel since the 1970s, including six calling for a ceasefire during the most recent conflict in Gaza. It owes nearly $4 billion in unpaid UN dues, and announced in January that it would cease engaging with a number of UN-based entities.
In an interview at the World Economic Forum with Indian media outlet NDTV in January, Banga acknowledged the US’s views, but maintained the Bank is playing an operational, not political, role focused on reconstruction – and batted aside concerns that the Board would undermine the UN. Incidentally, the Bank is currently finalising a refresh to its wider Strategy for Fragility, Conflict and Violence, with civil society long arguing that the Bank needs a more nuanced approach in post-conflict settings (see Observer Autumn 2025, Autumn 2019).
Amidst geopolitical rupture, Bank’s involvement raises more questions than answers
The Bank’s support for the Board of Peace comes amid the outsized role the Gaza conflict – and the US and Israel’s subsequent attack on Iran – has played in redrawing geopolitical alliances, transforming the context in which the institution operates (see Observer Autumn 2024).
The arrival of the second Trump administration put Bank management on notice, amid concerns the US might withdraw from the World Bank and IMF, given a wider pivot in its approach to multilateralism (see Dispatch Annuals 2025; Observer Autumn 2024).
A growing rift between the US and Europe on the Board of Peace – among other issues, including a potential US invasion of Greenland – has led longstanding US allies such as the UK, Germany and France to refrain from joining.
Furthermore, the Gaza conflict has had stark implications for relations between the West and the ‘majority world’, with a UN Commission finding in September 2025 that Israel’s activities in the Gaza Strip constituted genocide. New evidence published in The Lancet in February found the conflict resulted in over 75,000 violent deaths (3.4 per cent of Gaza’s pre-war population), with over half of these (56.2 per cent) being women, children and older people – much higher figures than previously estimated by the Gaza Ministry of Health.
As argued by former Singapore Ambassador to the UN, Kishore Mahbubani, in Foreign Affairs in February, “the simultaneous fighting in Ukraine and Gaza in 2024 and 2025 undermined Europe’s moral standing. Europeans have rightfully expressed horror over the killings of innocent civilians in Ukraine, but EU leaders remained mostly silent as Israel destroyed Gaza.…And it’s a key reason why the West is losing the rest.”
In this context, whatever Banga’s public reassurances, it’s clear the Board of Peace is operating in a hyper-politicised context. “The entire structure depends on the World Bank lending its credibility. Without the Bank’s imprimatur, investors would see this as a highly politicized reconstruction effort with no independent accountability,” an anonymous World Bank official told Devex in February.
In the end, the Bank’s involvement could well hasten the demise of the post-World War II international architecture of which it forms a part.
