Indonesia ready to send peacekeepers, medical staff to Gaza

Muslim-majority Indonesia is ready to send "significant peacekeeping forces" as well as medical personnel to Gaza if Hamas accepts a new ceasefire proposal, President-elect Prabowo Subianto said Saturday (1 June).

US President Joe Biden announced the Israeli roadmap to permanent peace in Gaza on Friday (31 May), as Israeli troops pushed into central Rafah despite international objections to any assault on the southern city.

Prabowo, who will succeed President Joko Widodo in October after winning the February elections, welcomed the plan, describing it as "an important step" to ending the war.

If requested by the United Nations, Indonesia was prepared to send "significant peacekeeping forces to maintain and monitor this prospective ceasefire", Prabowo told the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.

"We are also prepared to immediately send medical personnel to operate field hospitals in Gaza with the consent and agreement of all sides."

Prabowo said Indonesia was ready to "evacuate, receive and to treat" up to 1,000 patients in its hospitals "in the immediate future".

"In the interests of all sides, we must do our best to achieve a real and lasting solution," he told the security forum attended by defence ministers from around the world.

Hamas said Friday it "considers positively" the Israeli plan.

Biden said the proposal would begin with a six-week complete ceasefire and Israeli withdrawal from populated areas of Gaza.

Hamas, which triggered the war with its October 7 attack on Israel, would in return release hostages.

The two sides would then negotiate a longer-term deal aimed at ending the war.