
‘In a state of shock': Palestinians respond to Trump's proposal to take over Gaza
It's not easy to catch Palestinians off guard, given the scenes from 15 months of Israeli bombardment, siege, starvation, and the world's inaction to what Amnesty International has called a "genocide".
But if anyone can throw things off kilter, it's US President Donald Trump, who on Tuesday said the US would expel Palestinians from Gaza, likely move in American troops, and then develop 'the Riviera of the Middle East' for tourists.
The stunning announcement was made alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was given the privilege of being the first foreign leader to visit the White House in Trump's second term.
But the backlash to Trump's 'long-term ownership' of Gaza was swift.
Democratic Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian in the chamber, said, 'Palestinians aren't going anywhere'.
New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch
Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters
'This president can only spew this fanatical bullshit because of bipartisan support in Congress for funding genocide and ethnic cleansing,' Tlaib wrote on X. 'It's time for my two-state solution colleagues to speak up.'
Democratic Senator Chris Murphy called Trump's comments a mere distraction.
'The US isn't invading and occupying Gaza. Trump wants us to talk about this crazy idea all day to relieve the pressure on him that is building as the public figures out that a theft is occurring - the billionaires illegally taking over government to steal from us,' he wrote on X, referencing the domestic chaos unfolding as billionaire Elon Musk shuts down US agencies.
And Republican Senator Rand Paul, who has long identified as a Libertarian, said, 'The pursuit for peace should be that of the Israelis and the Palestinians.'
'I thought we voted for America First,' he wrote on X. 'We have no business contemplating yet another occupation to doom our treasure and spill our soldiers' blood.'
'A new Nakba'
Palestinians who have already left Gaza marvelled at what they saw as the callousness of Trump's remarks.
'I'm in a state of shock. I almost don't believe they can be rude as such,' Palestinian human rights lawyer Raji Sourani told Middle East Eye.
Sourani, 70, born and bred in Gaza, left through Egypt and then went to Europe one year ago after Israel destroyed his home. He remains the director of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights in Gaza and is a party to South Africa's genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice.
'A first-class war criminal [like] Netanyahu standing in the White House, invited… and dealt with respectfully as though there is no [International Criminal Court] warrant against him, and praised as a hero and supported politically, financially, legally, and they decide publicly in a press conference in front of the whole world… to complete the genocide mission? To make a new Nakba?' Sourani asked.
'I mean, I just don't believe it.'
Instead of expelling Palestinians, Sourani suggested the Israelis be offered one-way tickets instead.
'Why the Israelis not be paid? I mean, in the US, there is a huge, vast land. They can settle them anywhere they like. We didn't do the Holocaust.'
Palestinians, he said, 'are the stones of the valley… no power on earth can kick us out'.
And while many living inside Gaza today have expressed similar sentiments, others say the notion that all Palestinians will simply tolerate what comes their way is 'dehumanising'.
'You know, there is a lot of mythologisation of the Palestinians, that we are superhumans who, despite any pain, wouldn't leave. That's not true, and that's dehumanising to an extent,' Khalil Sayegh, a Palestinian political analyst based in Washington, told MEE.
Sayegh is the founder of the Palestinian-Israeli shared vision platform, The Agora Initiative.
His father died of a heart attack in Gaza in 2023 while sheltering at the Church of the Holy Family, which came under attack by Israeli snipers.
Trump advisors push for Gulf states to cooperate on Gaza but find no takers Read More »
'When we are pushed and we have to choose between staying or our kids will die, I think many of us would choose rightfully to leave,' he said. 'Others who stay, despite them dying with their kids, we also have to respect them and see them as humans.'
If the Rafah border to Egypt reopens, Sayegh said, he estimates that up to half a million Palestinians would leave Gaza now if they were provided the means.
It would be, he confessed, 'a disaster' for the Strip.
'However, in terms of ethnic cleansing and the demographic war that we have with Israel, that wouldn't be a threat because, ultimately, the birth rate in Gaza is so high that in three or four years, we'll be able to have the demographic balance back again,' Sayegh told MEE.
So where does that leave Trump's extreme opening bid to negotiate Gaza's future?
'Two things have to happen. In my opinion, Hamas has to clearly say that they're willing to not be in the picture. This hasn't happened at all… [And] the Arabs have to push Trump,' he said.
'We've seen the Arabs already doing that. We've seen the Egyptians already doing that [but] they have to come to the table, from my point of view, to Trump with a plan that is actionable.'
Saudi Arabia was the first among the Arab nations to denounce Trump's plans and insist on a Palestinian state before it considers what would be the ultimate prize: diplomatic relations with Israel.
Jordan and Egypt have also firmly rejected plans to take in Palestinians from Gaza.
'I think the Arabs so far are taking a good stance,' Sayegh told MEE. 'If they continue to do so, I think we can overcome this, inshallah.'
Ultimately, whatever Palestinians may be forced to do, they will not be 'good victims,' Sourani said.
'Whatever the conditions are or will be, people have no intention to leave. We have no other home, Palestine is our homeland.'
Aftermath
By Wednesday morning, Arab Americans For Trump, which led the charge to get him elected among those angered by Joe Biden's perpetuation of the war on Gaza, sent out a press release changing its name to Arab Americans For Peace.
'We are adamantly opposed to the notion of transferring Palestinians outside of historic Palestine for ANY reason,' the statement read. 'We appreciate the president's offer to clean and rebuild Gaza. However, the purpose should be to make Gaza habitable for Palestinians and no one else.'
Within hours, the administration began the cleanup effort, with officials significantly walking back Trump's proposal.
In an interview with CBS, Trump's national security advisor, Michael Waltz, all but admitted the president was effectively starting a negotiation process by adopting an extreme position.
'The fact that nobody has a realistic solution, and [Trump] puts some very bold fresh new ideas out on the table, I don't think should be criticised in any way,' Waltz said. 'I think it's going to bring the entire region to come with their own solutions.'
This was further communicated at the White House briefing, where press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters, 'Donald Trump, who is the best dealmaker on the planet, is going to strike a deal with our partners in the region.'
Asked about US 'boots on the ground' in Gaza, Leavitt said Trump has not 'committed' to that idea 'yet'.
And his real estate development of the enclave? 'This is an out-of-the-box idea,' Leavitt responded, and 'American taxpayers' will not be footing the bill, she said.
While on a trip to Guatemala, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio reframed Trump's entire proposal, saying that Palestinians would only relocate temporarily and that Trump's offer is an act of generosity.
'Obviously people are going to have to live somewhere while you're rebuilding it. It is akin to a natural disaster,' Rubio said. 'So what he's very generously offered is the ability of the United States to go in and help with debris removal, help with munitions removal, help with reconstruction, the rebuilding of homes and businesses and things of this nature, so that then people can move back in.'
Still, there was no way to take back what Trump very publicly put on the table.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Middle East Eye
4 hours ago
- Middle East Eye
US Secretary of State Rubio terminates all USAID positions abroad: Report
By the end of September, there will be no such thing as the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), The Guardian reported on Monday, because all of its overseas staff will be terminated. Many, if not most, are local hires who have depended on a USAID salary for years and sometimes decades to support their families. The Guardian attributed the revelation to a State Department cable that it had obtained. It said the chiefs of mission at embassies in more than 100 countries have been notified that a significant overhaul is coming. 'The Department of State is streamlining procedures under National Security Decision Directive 38 to abolish all USAID overseas positions,' the cable said. The State Department and Secretary of State Marco Rubio 'will assume responsibility for foreign assistance programming previously undertaken by USAID' from 15 June, it added. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters In early March, Rubio said that US President Donald Trump's purge of the six-decade-old USAID was complete and that 5,200 of its 6,200 programmes had been eliminated. The remaining programmes, he said, would now be administered 'more effectively' under the State Department and in consultation with Congress. The axing of the aid agency was an initiative from the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency, which aimed to save Washington billions in what it believed was unnecessary spending. Among its earliest finds was what the administration described as $50worth of condoms sent by the US "to Hamas". It was then revealed that it was a programme to prevent sexually transmitted diseases in the rural province of Gaza, Mozambique. Musk departed the administration two weeks ago. Since the Trump administration announced an immediate suspension of all foreign assistance, blocking ongoing aid programmes and freezing new funding, humanitarian workers around the world have been trying to work out exactly what this means for the millions of vulnerable people they are trying to keep alive. Middle East Eye reported on the impact of the initial USAID cuts on 1.8 million Sudanese experiencing famine. Food boxes sent by the US were rotting in warehouses because the agency no longer provided the money needed for the actual distribution. Since 1946, the Middle East and North Africa have been the biggest recipients of US financial assistance. Between April 2023 and April 2024, Congress appropriated around $9bn for the region. While most of the aid went towards military assistance, a fraction was funnelled into democracy programmes via USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy, a quasi-autonomous agency funded largely by the US Congress. MEE reported in May of this year that the Trump cuts to USAID have already impacted human rights defenders in the region who were reliant on the small grants to relocate and resettle abroad. Although modest in scope, the money provided a lifeline for exiled human rights activists.


The National
7 hours ago
- The National
Raids in the occupied West Bank city of Nablus
A masked Palestinian man walks past burning tyres set up to block a road during a large-scale Israeli army raid in the old town of Nablus city in the occupied West Bank. AFP


Zawya
8 hours ago
- Zawya
Blackstone to invest $500bln in Europe over next decade, Bloomberg reports
Blackstone plans to invest up to $500 billion in Europe over the next decade, CEO Steve Schwarzman told Bloomberg Television in an interview on Tuesday, underscoring market confidence in the region's prospects. Schwarzman said Europe represents a "major opportunity" for the world's largest alternative asset manager, which oversees assets worth over $1 trillion. There has been a surge in investor optimism about the region, driven by European governments' push to increase military spending and revive a sluggish private equity market. With U.S. President Donald Trump reshaping global alliances and trade policies, Europe is actively pursuing new avenues for economic growth, potentially creating promising investment opportunities for firms such as Blackstone. The European Union, for example, is ramping up its defense spending to revitalize a sector historically overlooked by private investors. Since 2020, the U.S. and Canada have attracted 83% of all private equity and venture capital-backed aerospace and defense investment, according to S&P. Europe is starting to change its approach, "which we think will result in higher growth rates. So this has worked out amazingly well for us," Schwarzman told Bloomberg. Schwarzman supported Trump in the U.S. presidential election last year, according to a report from Axios. He has long been viewed as an ally of the president. Trump's whiplash tariffs have, however, prompted several businesses to optimize their supply chains to reduce U.S. exposure. "The U.S. administration's tariffs - combined with any retaliatory measures from its trading partners - will deliver a supply shock to the U.S. and a demand shock to the rest of the world, including China and Europe," said Blerina Uruçi, chief U.S. economist at T. Rowe Price. ($1 = 0.8753 euros)