US President Donald Trump on Tuesday reiterated the idea of displacing Palestinians from Gaza, saying the people there had no alternative but to leave the Palestinian enclave, which had been devastated by Israel’s military assault. He called the Palestinian territory a “demolition site” and expressed his desire for a deal to permanently resettle people from the war-torn enclave.
The US president made those comments before welcoming Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House.
Trump called for Jordan and Egypt to take in Gazans, saying Palestinians there had no alternative but to leave the coastal strip while it is being rebuilt after nearly 16 months of a devastating war between Israel and Hamas militants.
“” The Gaza thing never worked. It is a natural demolition site. If we can locate the right land or a lot of land, and build very lovely ones with a lot of cash in the region, that’s for sure. I think it would be much greater than going back to Gaza,” he told Newshounds in the Oval Office.
“I think they would be delighted,” he said, adding, “I don’t know how (Palestinians) might need to stay,” when asked for the reaction of Palestinian leaders and Arabs to his proposal.
The Republican leader has already proposed this idea, which has been rejected through the Arab states and the Palestinian authority. Some human rights defenders have even equated with ethnic cleaning.
Trump organized Netanyahu in the White House to talk about the long execution of the Alto El Fuego de Gaza, methods to counteract Iran and customers of a renewed thrust towards an Israeli-Saudite normalization agreement. While Netanyahu arrived, Trump praised him at the door and the two leaders posed for photographs, smiling.
This meeting, Trump’s first with a foreign leader since his return to office on January 20, was intended to highlight the strong ties between the president and Netanyahu, following a period of strained relations between the Israeli prime minister and President Biden over Israel’s handling of the Gaza war.
However, Netanyahu may face tension from a U. S. president who is unpredictable whose broader political goals in the Middle East do not align with Netanyahu’s domestic and geopolitical interests.