Trump's comment to 'cleanse' Gaza has excited Israel's distant and angry Palestinians
Faced with numerous and potential cafes on his border with Israel, Donald Trump fanned the flames on Saturday with new comments about permanently moving the Palestinian population of Gaza to other countries.
Calling Gaza a “place of destruction”, the US president said he had raised the issue with the King of Jordan, offering Arab countries for the Palestinians so they could “change in peace”.
“We're just cleaning that whole thing up,” Trump reportedly told reporters of the Air Force.
Whether his words signaled a real change in US policy or just musings is unknown, however, a comment that ricocheted across the Middle East on Sunday.
Islamic Jihad – one of the armed groups that participated in the attack on October 7, 2023, killed More than 1200 people And, which is still holding Israel hostage in Gaza, issued a statement saying it condemned “the deportation of our people in the strongest possible terms.”
The group states that Trump's comment reflects an “extreme Zionist agenda” and denial of Palestinian identity.
A senior Hamas official also dismissed the notion as out of hand.
“The people of Gaza have endured death to prevent them from leaving their homeland, and they will not for any other reason,” Sami Abu Zuhri said in a statement.
Indeed, among the few positive reactions to Trump's comments came from the leaders of Israel's extremist settlements, which have made the removal of Palestinians from Gaza and the occupied West Bank their main political goal.
Bezalel Smotrich, the leader of Israel's religious “Zionism” party, who is also the country's finance minister, called Trump's proposal “a great idea.”
Gaza in ruins after 15 months of war
Human rights groups such as Amnesty International, have repeatedly accused Israel of ethnic cleansing in a deliberate attempt to destroy Palestinian society with a 15-month bombing campaign in Gaza in response to the October 7 Hamas LED attack.
Since then, more than 47,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to health officials there, and the UN says more than two-thirds of Gaza's buildings have been destroyed or damaged.
The leaders of Israel, as well as the politicians of the republican and democratic parties of the United States, rejected the demand for genocide.
The Trudeau government has too said It disagrees with South Africa's arguments at the court of justice that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
“No Palestinian … could take his deal”
Despite agreeing to a three-phase cease-fire earlier this month, including a hostage and prisoner exchange, the Israeli government has refused to lay out a vision for a post-war Gaza or say how it thinks it will shape the territory.
On Saturday, Hamas released four female Israeli soldiers in exchange for 200 Palestinians.Videos released by Israeli forces showed the women hugging their parents, smiling and in tears, while crowds waving Palestinian flags greeted Israelis. occupied West Bank.
For Arab nations, particularly Jordan and Egypt, which have long-standing peace treaties with Israel, the prospect of Western or Israeli capture of Gaza's Palestinians has long been seen as intensely destabilizing and politically unacceptable.
On Sunday, Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said his country's opposition to what was looted was “solid and unbreakable.” Egypt's foreign ministry said in a statement that it rejects any attempt to displace Palestinians from their land, either temporarily or in the long term.
United Nations Relief and Works Agency (Misbehavior) already counts more than 2.3 million Palestinians living in Jordan.
“There is no Palestinian as far as I know that could accept his deal,” he said Yohanan TzoreffSenior Research Fellow at the Israel National Security Institute in Tel Aviv.
An Israeli, Israeli was involved in the implementation of the Oslo Accords and worked closely with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in the peace process, often serving as his Arabic translator.
“The idea of creating refugees, the idea of moving people from one area to another, is one of the complex issues of Arab history and especially Palestinian history,” Tzoreff told News.
“If (Trump) speaks publicly about it and announces something, you put all the Arabs in the Middle East in a position where they will do their own thing.”
The Palestinians decided to start
A second exchange of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners took place over the weekend, with four women from the Israel Defense Forces returning to Israel and 200 Palestinians being released from prison.
In the days since the ceasefire came into effect, there have also been incredible scenes of Palestinians trying to return to their dismantled neighborhoods in Gaza, determined to start rather than leave the territory.
On Sunday, a sea of tens of thousands of people stood next to Israeli checkpoints and the roadway, what Israel calls the Netzariim Corridor, trying to return to towns and neighborhoods in northern Gaza.
Under the terms of the ceasefire, hundreds of thousands of civilians were to be allowed in on Saturday, but Israel has accused Hamas of reneging on aspects of the deal, and in response, it has blocked people from returning.
Among those waiting, the response to Trump's deportation proposal was universally negative.
“This is our country, our country and the country of our ancestors,” said 60-year-old Saya al-Siqali, a videographer working for CBC News. “We don't answer to the American president.”
“(Trump) cannot deport and force immigration on people from their country,” said 58-year-old Samir al-Sultan.
“Either we all become martyrs or return to our cities, leaving our cities, leaving our country is impossible.”
Israel's neighbors have long been worried about its government carrying out another forced displacement of Palestinians.
Before and after the establishment of Israel in 1948, more than 700,000 people fled, or were driven from their homes in what the Arabs call Nakbaor disaster.
Later, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were forced to flee after the 1967 war, when Israel occupied the West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem.
Many of the displaced ended up in Gaza, as well as in refugee camps in the occupied West Bank.
The fate of the leader and how they can ever return to their ancestral homes in Israel have been among the most pressing issues facing peace negotiators.
“I don't know who his (Trump's) advisers are and who he's talking to … but I think they need to think again,” said Telf, the Telf-based analyst.
While the previous Biden administration was heavily criticized for not using its influence with the Netanyahu government to push for a cease-fire earlier, it rejected mass displacement as a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian crisis.
In one of his last public appearances, former Secretary of State Antony Blinken repeated That Israel's “real security” can only be achieved by recognizing a Palestinian state.
A new US administration could signal a change in policy
Trump has made no such announcements in his short tenure as president, but his pick for US ambassador to Israel suggests the new administration may abandon the two-state solution.
Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, an ardent supporter of Israel, was quoted Word that there is no such thing as Palestinian and that the concept is used as a “political tool to try and force the country to stay away from Israel”.
Hockaby also said that if there is a state for the Palestinians, it should be carved out of the lands belonging to Israel's Arab neighbors, not Israel itself.
Trump drew praise from the families of Israelis held hostage in Gaza for using his influence to push Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas into the current tense ceasefire.
But the expulsion, forced removal, or otherwise re-release of Gaza's Palestinians represents an idea that has repeatedly led to more conflict, not less.
It's unclear how far Trump plans to push it.
