Two weeks ago, President Trump announced that he intends to take over Gaza. Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu shared warm smiles as they discussed dislocating two million Palestinians with no regard for their homeland.
At the conference, President Trump stated, “The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it, too.” The disgusting casualness of his voice only worsened as he said that he would make Gaza into “The Riviera of the Middle East.” Netanyahu relished Trump’s words and added that his plans are “the kind of thinking that will reshape the Middle East and bring peace,” the Prime Minister’s comment contrasts sharply with his actions. Under Netanyahu’s command, over 45,000 Palestinians have been killed, along with thousands of others in neighboring countries like Lebanon and Yemen. Furthermore, he has arrest warrants from the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Although the Israel Palestine conflict has devastated the region for almost 100 years, there is no denying that the last five hundred days have led to the destruction of Gaza. Now, President Trump wants to forcibly remove the people who have survived the conflict and convert their homes into a real estate venture. Trump’s new plan has been immensely popular in Israel, according to The Jerusalem Post; however, sixteen percent of pollers said the plan is “morally reprehensible,” and another fourteen percent said it should only be voluntary. The concept of Gazans being able to leave voluntarily has been one that has been argued over for many years. Before the conflict, their ability to leave and return to Gaza was limited due to laws put in place by Israel and Egypt. While it’s essential to take note of the fact that some people may want to leave due to the unsafe conditions, giving Palestinians no choice either way is incredibly problematic.
With the new Trump administration, the United States appears to be taking a more aggressive role in the Israel-Palestine conflict than the military funding of the Biden administration. President Trump wants to take a more active role and buy Gaza to displace millions of Palestinians, ignoring what they want, which will heighten the conflicts that this region has already faced. This newfound desire to control the Gaza Strip directly contradicts all of the rhetoric Trump used in his first term when the U.S. withdrew troops from Afghanistan. Furthermore, it directly speaks to the fact that Trump intends to make the Gaza Strip appear like there were never any Palestinians there, something that Netanyahu appears to want as well as he continues to order bombings in the area after the Cease-fire deal started.
The ceasefire deal is now even more of a sensitive subject because Trump’s escalation of the conflict puts it at immense risk. Dozens of hostages are still yet to be freed and might never get to be if the conflict starts up again. Secondly, Trump’s efforts to displace Palestinians could bring the war back to full force and continue to put the lives of both the hostages and other civilians in danger. A danger that, unfortunately, has been much too familiar to people on the West Bank.
In the following weeks, Trump’s aides responded to his comments at the conference, with Netanyahu defending them by stressing that this is a way to get the ball moving. By threatening a United States takeover of the Gaza Strip, the other leaders of Middle Eastern countries will be forced to come up with a plan that Israel will accept. However, I think that threatening governments with ethnic cleansing if they do not come up with a solution is incredibly problematic.
Netanyahu has continued to defend Trump’s comments, saying that his plan is “the only viable plan to enable a different future” for the Middle East. However, this “only viable plan” for the Middle East “amounts to ethnic cleansing” and “forcible displacement of an occupied group (which) is an international crime,” according to the United Nations. There has been significant debate about what counts as “ethnic cleansing.” However, Brittanica defines it as “the attempt to create ethnically homogeneous geographic areas through the deportation or forcible displacement of persons belonging to particular ethnic groups.” President Trump is proposing to do this, but he hides it with all of his flowering real estate language, making his plan appear like the best choice.
Trump’s desire to “buy Gaza” speaks to the amount of disregard he has for the people affected by the war. In his speech with Netanyahu, he made it atrociously clear that to him, the Palestinian people have no right to their homes and will have no choice in where and when they are displaced. Furthermore, Trump displays a complete disregard for the other Arab countries to which he is going to move the Palestinians where they will be housed in “beautiful sites.” Multiple Middle Eastern nations have rebuked Trump’s proposal, stating that they will not take in the people once displayed and that his plan will not foster peace and prosperity like Netanyahu and Trump think it will.
It is especially interesting that Trump continuously proposes plans to “rebuild Gaza” when he has consistently been pulling funding out of the foreign aid fund, which has caused mass suffering to hundreds of communities that use that funding to survive. If Trump truly wants prosperity for the Middle East — which he doesn’t appear to — it would be much more productive to help fund the rebuilding of Gaza without displacement and continue the flow of humanitarian aid that has helped those effects during the war.
Unfortunately, Trump’s conference with Netanyahu showed to the American people and the Middle East that the United States government has no intention of recognizing the Palestinian people’s right to their homes and that they will continue to align with Israel in the conflict. I hope that as international councils begin to form plans to combat Trump’s new ideas, there will be a decision reached that ensures the safety of the Palestinian people and truly establishes peace for all.