By Ramzy Baroud & Romana Rubeo
Trump’s proposal to take “ownership” of Gaza is a reckless move that emboldens Israel and threatens regional stability.
US President Donald Trump has doubled down on earlier comments, once again proposing that the US take “ownership” of Gaza and redevelop it.
This time, the remarks came on Tuesday during a joint press conference at the White House with right-wing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“I don’t think people should be going back,” Trump said, referring to Gaza. “You can’t live in Gaza right now. I think we need another location. I think it should be a location that’s going to make people happy.”
Capitalizing on the provocative statement, Netanyahu quickly responded, calling Trump “the greatest friend Israel has ever had in the White House” and praising him for “thinking outside the box with new ideas.”
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Netanyahu’s supporters in Israel celebrated what they saw as a historic moment. Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called Trump’s plan “the true response to October 7.” Ben-Gvir urged Netanyahu to adopt the policy “immediately,” saying, “It is time to implement and promote it.”
Arab countries strongly rejected any attempt to ethnically cleanse Palestinians. The Saudi foreign ministry swiftly issued a statement reaffirming its “firm and unwavering” position on the establishment of a Palestinian state and rejecting “any infringement on the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, whether through Israeli settlement policies, land annexation, or attempts to displace the Palestinian people from their land.”
Trump’s comments generated widespread media interest and political reactions for two reasons.
First, they were made in the presence of Netanyahu, signaling a possible shift in US foreign policy toward an even more destructive path in Palestine and the broader region. Second, Trump was not speaking off the cuff but reading from pre-prepared remarks, indicating that this proposal was being considered as an actual foreign policy doctrine.
In an attempt to understand the timing and nature of Trump’s remarks, many analysts linked them to the growing influence of pro-Israel evangelicals and extremists within his administration. Others suggested that Trump was preparing the US for a regional war, while some dismissed the proposal as just another element of his ‘maximum pressure’ tactics.
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At the Palestine Chronicle, we believe Trump’s proposal is neither realistic nor serious. However, the consequences of such reckless foreign policy will be dangerous in both the short and long term.
Here are some of the reasons Trump made this proposal, followed by other reasons why the displacement of Palestinians from Gaza will not happen.
Why Trump Made This Proposal
One, Trump is eager to sustain the ceasefire in Gaza. To do so, he needed to offer Netanyahu a political gift that could pacify Israelis across the political spectrum and prevent what many believe is the imminent collapse of his government—even civil war.
Two, the Israeli military defeat in Gaza has left both Tel Aviv and Washington without any real leverage to reshape the outcome of the war or the region’s politics. By shifting the conversation to his outlandish proposal, Trump believes he can reclaim the initiative for the US and Israel.
Three, Trump understands that Saudi Arabia is reluctant to normalize ties with Israel. Over the past year and a half, the Saudis have come to see Israel as an unreliable potential partner, and US support for Israel has pushed the region closer to all-out war.
Israel’s defeat in Gaza has also shattered its image as a regional hegemon, strengthening the position of the Resistance camp and Iran. The idea of Israel as a protector against Iran has all but disappeared, making normalization less urgent—if necessary at all. Trump’s proposal is a desperate attempt to empower Israel and warn the region that, with US backing, it can still cause devastation at a moment’s notice.
Four, by escalating his rhetoric on Gaza, Trump is giving Israel more time and space to carry out incremental ethnic cleansing in the West Bank. According to the Jenin governorate, nearly 4,000 families have already been displaced from the Jenin refugee camp, amounting to the majority of its population. Similar campaigns are underway throughout the northern West Bank.
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While international media and politicians focus on Trump’s Gaza proposal, Israel is executing its largest ethnic cleansing operation in the occupied West Bank since the 1967 war.
Five, Trump is also hoping to use the political chaos generated by his statements to extract concessions from Palestinians and Arab governments. His main focus remains the West Bank, as he reiterated on Monday that “Israel is a small country in terms of land.”
The trade-off he likely envisions is either abandoning his campaign to ethnically cleanse Gaza in exchange for Palestinian and Arab territorial concessions in the West Bank, securing Saudi normalization without an Israeli commitment to a Palestinian state, or both.
Why Displacing Palestinians from Gaza Will Not Happen
One, Trump is relying on the same tactics his administration used during his first term. However, Israel’s genocide in Gaza and the Palestinian resistance over the course of 471 days have put Palestine back at the center of Middle Eastern politics. The era of marginalizing the Palestinian cause is over.
Two, the resilience of Gazans, who have sustained 471 days of resistance against Israel, is stronger than ever. When Trump suggested displacing Palestinians, one million people were not amassing at the Gaza-Egypt border but moving north, back to their towns and refugee camps, in an unprecedented display of people’s power. It is difficult to imagine these same Gazans voluntarily leaving their land to give “ownership” to Trump and his real estate allies.
Three, perhaps the most crucial point is that Israel has already tried—using endless US weapons—to displace Gazans into Sinai for 471 days. To achieve this, it destroyed most of Gaza and all of its infrastructure, created famine, and killed or wounded over 173,000 people—a number expected to rise dramatically in the coming months.
None of this would have been possible without US support, yet all of it has failed. There is nothing more the US can do that it has not already done, including outright genocide and extermination.
‘Firm and Unwavering’ – Saudi Arabia Rejects Trump’s Gaza Displacement Plan
Four, Arab governments have collectively rejected Trump’s proposal, which has also been condemned, directly or indirectly, by governments worldwide.
The real danger does not lie in the US military invading Gaza to uproot Palestinians but in the fact that the extremist Israeli government may interpret Trump’s words as a blank check to accelerate ethnic cleansing in the West Bank and possibly return to war in Gaza, claiming to act in line with the wishes of the American president.
While Joe Biden’s administration has already shown it lacks any moral fiber by supporting and sustaining Israel’s genocide in Gaza, a future Trump administration would bring an even more reckless and ignorant approach.
Armed with an arrogant misunderstanding of the Middle East, complete detachment from historical realities, and the religious zeal of biblical prophecy, Trump’s foreign policy is nothing short of a catastrophe.
If one were to describe his new doctrine in the region, it would be like a bull in a china shop. Though senseless, the only possible outcome is utter destruction.
(The Palestine Chronicle)
