Uganda backs deployment of troops for Gaza Strip force
The Ugandan parliament has approved the deployment of troops to the Gaza Strip as part of an International Stabilisation Force.
Uganda’s parliament has voted to approve the deployment of its military to the Gaza Strip, if it is needed as part of a multinational security force proposed under US President Donald Trump’s ceasefire plan for the enclave.
Before the vote, Ugandan Defence Minister Kiryowa Kiwanuka told MPs that Trump had, through emissaries, contacted Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni in July seeking the country’s contribution to the international force.
An Israeli official said last month people from “friendly countries” including Uganda could join the force if it was deployed.
Thursday’s parliamentary debate was the first time Uganda itself had publicly acknowledged it might take part.
After a fragile ceasefire deal was struck in October, Trump set out a peace plan for the Gaza Strip that provided for a surge in humanitarian aid, civilian administration by Palestinian technocrats, Hamas laying down its arms and Israeli forces withdrawing.
The plan has stalled and the group of technocrats – known as the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza – has remained outside the enclave.
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Under the plan, an International Stabilisation Force (ISF) is envisioned deploying in areas that are not under Israeli control.
It is unclear when any such force will deploy.
At the end of July, the Israeli security cabinet granted authorisation for part of the ISF, as well as representatives of the Palestinian Interim Administration, to begin work shortly in a limited area in Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip.
Gazan health authorities have said that the overall casualty toll since the announcement of a ceasefire agreement on October 10, 2025, is 1,209 people killed and 3,943 injured.
After attacks on a medical storage facility next to Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah last weekend, the UN World Health Organization said that essential medical supplies had been destroyed, including some delivered by the agency.
Amid reports of a new United States-led peace plan for the war-torn enclave and a recent spike in Israeli airstrikes on alleged Hamas targets in Gaza, UNICEF also has said that families are now confined to approximately one third of the Strip, sheltering among destroyed buildings, rubble and uncleared waste.
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At the recent Adelaide Labor Party Conference, Labor’s 400 elected delegates voted to adopt the party’s 2026 National Platform that included nine points on Israel-Palestine.
This ranged from stating the party’s support for a two-state solution, recognising the state of Palestine, opposing the annexation of Palestinian territory and “reaffirms our belief that Israelis and Palestinians deserve to live their lives free from terror and violence”.
A push to recognise claims of genocide in Gaza failed to gain enough support for a debate on the floor.
Uganda is one of the largest contributors of troops to peacekeeping missions in Africa.
It has contingents deployed in several countries including Somalia, South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
“Following the invitation by His Excellency Donald Trump … the President of the Republic of Uganda, is ready to deploy in the Gaza Strip the desired Uganda People’s Defence Forces contingent,” Kiwanuka told MPs.
During the debate, some MPs asked about the legal arrangement that would govern the deployment.
Kiwanuka said a status of forces agreement would be signed after the vote.
Much of the Gaza Strip remains in ruins from two years of full-scale war triggered by the Hamas-led attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023. United Nations reports
– with DPA
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