Trump suggests that he wants ethnic cleansing in Gaza. Is that feasible? | Israel-Palestine News of Conflict
Washington, DC – Scenes of jubilements and tearful gatherings take place via Gaza’s belt, as hundreds of thousands of displaced people march to their homes in the north of the territory.
The fragile truce after 15 months of war in Gaza allowed a return. But while advocates of law welcomes a rare case of reverse displacement in Palestinian history, the President of the United States Donald Trump has called for a transfer The whole population treads in Egypt and Jordan.
“You’re talking about probably a million and a half people,” Trump told reporters. “We just clean up that whole thing and say, ‘You know, it’s over. “
Analysts say Trump’s proposal would make ethnic cleansing, but it is unlikely that they will be realized in terms of geopolitical reality in the region.
Yousef Munayyer, Head of Palestine/Israel at the Washington DC Arab Center, said Trump’s “amazing” statement should be condemned for violating all norms and basic rights.
He added, however, that it should be taken with the degree of skepticism.
“Trump says all kinds of things,” Munayyer explained. “Sometimes the things he means. Sometimes the things he doesn’t mean. Sometimes the things he heard in the conversation he led five minutes ago. Sometimes things he thinks he has heard but misunderstood.”
Munayyer has told the idea of ethnic cleansing Gaza has not been new and has been circulating since the war broke out in October 2023.
But conversations about the displacement of the Palestinians to Egypt, the only Arabian land bordering on the territory, Kairo quickly closed. Jordan, sitting next to the occupied west coast, also rejected mass displacement.
Both countries repeated their views after Trump’s recent comments.
“This is not just about how these countries feel Palestine or what they think of the Israeli-Palestinian question,” Munayyyer said.
“It is also about their own issues of national security – existential issues of national security, which cannot really be reduced in this discussion.”
Egypt and Jordan say no
On Wednesday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi strongly emphasized that Egypt will not participate in any campaign Remove the palestine From Gaza, citing “injustice” of displacement, as well as Egyptian security.
“I want to ensure the Egyptian people that indulgence or enabling a violation of the national security of Egypt will not be allowed,” he said.
El-Sisi added that if he considered the acceptance of the displacement of Palestinians, the Egyptian people would go out to the streets to warn him of the move.
“I say clearly: displacement Palestinian people From their country is an injustice in which we will not participate, “he said.
Jordan repeated this attitude, and Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said the position of Hashemit Kingdom was “irreversibly and unchanged”.
While Trump has gained reputation for strong weapons Other countries, analysts say that Egypt and Jordan have key interests that would make the accepting the displaced people from Gaza a non-stanter.
Both governments are afraid of returning from their population, which would be considered a betrayal in ethnic cleansing Palestinian causewhich remains the central question in the region.
Furthermore, the approach of hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians, including thousands of combat fighters, could destabilize political, economic and security structures in Egypt and Jordan, said experts in Al Jazeera.
Nancy Okail, President of the International Policy Center, a research center based in the US, said Trump comments are not based on any real strategy.
“The Egyptian government, and especially President El-SisiThey were very clear and very firm that this was without a problem; It’s a red line, “Okail said.” There’s no way to be accepted. “
She added that Trump, a self-written deal, can try to use access to carrots and wedge to convince Egypt to accept Palestine from Gaza, but El-Sisi would not even entertain the idea.
“First of all, it’s a matter of capacity. It’s also a question of legitimacy. And most importantly, it’s a direct threat to the stability of the earth,” Okail said.
Annelle Sheline, a research associate with the Quincy Institute for Responsible State of the State, said Jordan faces similar problems with mass displacement.
Although people should “care” about Trump’s proposal, Sheline said that the US president “may not have completely considered the consequences of” this policy for Jordan and the whole region.
“This is so crazy because I hear it so often, people who say,” Why don’t other countries take them or why they just don’t leave? “So, why doesn’t Israel stop trying to kill them? That’s the right question,” Sheline told Al Jazeera.
Trump’s statement
Fallout started on Saturday when Trump explicitly stunned the Middle East, by explicitly calling to switch the gauze population devastated tape.
“I wish Egypt would take people and I would like Jordan to take people,” Trump said.
He justified his proposal by describing the destruction in Gaza, after more than a year of non -Stop Israeli bombing.
“It’s a literal place to demolish right now. Almost everything is demolished, and people die there,” Trump said. “So, I would rather deal with some Arab peoples and build a housing elsewhere, where I might live in peace for change.”
He said a shift could be temporary or “long -term”.
Despite the return, Trump doubled his proposal on Monday, claiming that he had talked about El-Sisi about the matter.
“I would like to take it [Palestinians]”, Trump said.” We helped them a lot and I’m sure he would help us. “
Egypt is the best recipient of American aid. But neither the White House nor the Egyptian Presidency published the read of the alleged call between Trump and El-Sisi.
Us by law ‘we are not restrained’
Trump’s remarks indicate the reversal of their predecessor Joe Biden, said the policy of rejecting the permanent removal of Palestinians from Gaza.
However, in October 2023, at the beginning of the war, a request for financing under the bidan It floated the possibility mass movement.
The White House letter to Congress suggested the help of Israel “to support the displaced and civilians affected by conflicts, including Palestinian refugees in Gaza and the West Coast” and “resolve the potential needs of Gazanians fleeing to neighboring countries.”
Sheline said that, in an “alternative universe” in which Arab countries could agree to take over the displaced Palestine, the Bidana Administration supported the massive removal of the Gaza population.
“International law has not been restrained by the United States or Israel when it comes to Palestinians – really ever, and especially under the previous administration,” said Sheline, who resigned from the American State Department in protest because of his gauze policy.
She pointed out that US laws require the country to dismiss military assistance to countries that commit human rights violation.
“It was clear under Biden that he had no intention of respecting even international or With US laws This would require now to interrupt the security assistance to Israel. “
Ethnic cleansing can also be considered a war crime and a crime against humanity – and critics say that Trump’s proposal makes it fit the description.
In 1994, experts of the United Nations defined ethnic cleansing as “a purposeful policy designed by an ethnic or religious group that will remove violently and terrorist inspirational means the civilian population of another ethnic or religious group from certain geographical areas.”
Israeli Minister of Finance Bezalel Greetings welcomed Trump’s comments on Monday, saying he was working with the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu And the rest of the cabinet “prepare the operating plan and ensure the knowledge of the vision of President Trump.”
Munayyer said that Israel showed his actions that he wanted to depopulate Gaza.
“One thing is to spend ethnic cleansing by sending a truck and loading people and then forcing them to weapons,” he said.
“Another way to do this is simply destroying everyone there, making it uninhabited, and then basically forcing this problem by being impossible to live there. And I think this was the goal of Israelis all the time.”
The future of gauze
Munayyer emphasized that gauze reconstruction requires political will and permanent truce, not the displacement of its population.
“People were all over there genocide“He said.” They were not at all the dangers of death now that the bombs stopped falling on them. This is far from the ideal situation. But if you wanted to actually start reconstruction and provide temporary housing and shelter and utilities to these people while the renovation takes place, it is not like going to Mars. “
Gaza is still in the first phase of the truce, which began on January 19 and will last 42 days. The future of territory, including renewal plans, will not be completed to the second and third part of the agreement.
But the main questions remain who will manage the gauze. Israel and now they said they would not allow Hamas to stay in power.
Last month, then -state secretary Antony Blinkin He introduced the plan “the day after” for Gaza in which other countries would send troops to the staff of temporary security forces, running the way “fully reformed” Palestinian authority (PA) to manage the territory.
However, it is not clear whether Hamas will accept foreign troops in Gaza. Moreover, Netanyahu repeatedly rejected the surrender of the territory and despite the close Security coordination with Israeli forces on the west coast.
Okail said that Palestinian voices are missing from the conversation about the future of Gaza, emphasizing that the question of who manages Palestinian territories should not be dictated by the US, Israel or regional forces.
“Without resistance and dictating who manages and who runs for elections, Palestinians have the opportunity. They have a will and have the ability to participate in the political process, “she said.
