AFPPresident Donald Trump has mentioned he’s “dedicated to purchasing and proudly owning” the Gaza Strip and relocating the 2 million Palestinians residing there, regardless of international condemnation of the plan he unveiled final week.
He instructed reporters that he may enable Center East international locations to be concerned in rebuilding components of the territory and that he would be certain the Palestinian refugees would “stay superbly”.
Each the Palestinian Authority and the armed group Hamas, whose 16-month struggle with Israel has brought about widespread devastation in Gaza, reiterated that Palestinian land was “not on the market”.
However Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised Trump’s proposal as “revolutionary and inventive”.
It comes three weeks right into a fragile ceasefire in Gaza, throughout which Hamas has launched a number of the Israeli hostages it’s holding in alternate for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
The Israeli navy launched a marketing campaign to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented cross-border assault on 7 October 2023, during which about 1,200 individuals have been killed and 251 have been taken hostage.
Greater than 48,180 individuals have been killed in Gaza since then, in accordance with the territory’s Hamas-run well being ministry.
Most of Gaza’s inhabitants has additionally been displaced a number of instances, virtually 70% of buildings are estimated to be broken or destroyed, the healthcare, water, sanitation and hygiene methods have collapsed, and there are shortages of meals, gas, medication and shelter.
Trump repeated his pledge to take over post-war Gaza as he flew to New Orleans on Air Pressure One to observe the Tremendous Bowl on Sunday.
“I am dedicated to purchasing and proudly owning Gaza. So far as us rebuilding it, we might give it to different states within the Center East to construct sections of it. Different individuals might do it by means of our auspices. However we’re dedicated to proudly owning it, taking it, and ensuring that Hamas would not transfer again,” he mentioned, with out explaining who he would purchase Gaza from and the way the US would personal it.
“There’s nothing to maneuver again into. The place is a demolition website… The rest can be demolished,” he added. “However we’ll make it into an excellent website for future improvement by anyone.”
Trump mentioned individuals from all around the world would be capable of transfer to Gaza and promised to “maintain the Palestinians”.
“We’re going to ensure they stay superbly and in concord and peace and that they are not murdered.”
“They do not wish to return to Gaza. They solely return as a result of they don’t have any various,” he added.
The president additionally once more expressed confidence that he might persuade neighbouring Egypt and Jordan to assist, regardless of their earlier public rejections of his requests to soak up refugees from Gaza.
Jordan’s King Abdullah is because of meet Trump in Washington on Tuesday, whereas Israel’s president mentioned Trump would additionally maintain talks with Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman within the coming days.
ReutersIsrael’s prime minister praised Trump’s proposal at a cupboard assembly in Jerusalem on Sunday.
“For a full 12 months, we now have been instructed that on the ‘day after’, the PLO [Palestine Liberation Organisation], the Palestinian Authority, must be within the Strip,” Netanyahu mentioned.
“President Trump got here with a totally totally different imaginative and prescient, significantly better for the State of Israel, a revolutionary and inventive imaginative and prescient, which we’re discussing. He’s very decided to hold it out. This additionally opens many potentialities earlier than us.”
The Palestinian Authority’s international ministry mentioned: “The rights of our individuals and our land aren’t on the market, alternate or bargaining.”
“The Israeli authorities and Prime Minister Netanyahu try to cowl up the crimes of genocide, pressured displacement and annexation which they’ve dedicated in opposition to our individuals,” it added.
“For this function, they proceed to advertise slogans and positions that are separate from the political actuality and much from the necessities of the political options to the battle.”
A political official from Hamas – which is proscribed as a terrorist organisation by Israel, the US, the UK and different international locations – mentioned Trump’s remarks have been “absurd” and mirrored “deep ignorance of Palestine and the area”.
“Gaza is just not a property to be bought and purchased. It’s an integral a part of our occupied Palestinian land,” Izzat al-Rishq acknowledged.
The UN human rights workplace warned that any forcible switch in, or deportation of, individuals from occupied territory was strictly prohibited beneath worldwide regulation.
Palestinians additionally concern a repeat of the Nakba, or “disaster”, when tons of of hundreds fled or have been pushed from their houses earlier than and throughout the struggle that adopted the creation of the State of Israel in 1948.
Lots of these refugees ended up in Gaza, the place they and their descendants make up three quarters of the inhabitants. One other 900,000 registered refugees stay within the West Financial institution, whereas 3.4 million others stay in Jordan, Syria and Lebanon, in accordance with the UN.
Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz additionally strongly criticised Trump’s plan on Sunday, calling it a “scandal”.
“I say this with the Egyptian authorities, with the Jordanian authorities and with the individuals who can rely on human dignity: the relocation of a inhabitants is unacceptable and in opposition to worldwide regulation,” he mentioned throughout a televised pre-election debate.
AFPPalestinian officers and Arab states additionally condemned feedback made by Netanyahu in a TV interview final week.
An Israeli journalist was discussing efforts to normalise diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia when he mistakenly mentioned there can be no progress with out the creation of a “Saudi state”.
“A Palestinian state.” Netanyahu corrected him, earlier than including: “Until you need the Palestinian state to be in Saudi Arabia? They’ve a variety of territory.”
Egypt referred to as the suggestion “reckless” and one thing that “straight infringes upon Saudi sovereignty”, whereas Jordan mentioned it was “a flagrant violation of worldwide regulation”.
Saudi Arabia mentioned on Sunday that it appreciated the “condemnation, disapproval and complete rejection introduced by the brotherly international locations in the direction of what Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged concerning the displacement of the Palestinian individuals from their land”.