Alice Cuddy and Jon Donnison
BBC News, Jerusalem
ReutersUS President Donald Trump has said he wants Egypt and Jordan to recruit Palestinians from Gaza, which he described as a “demolition site”.
Trump said in a phone call this weekend that he had told Jordan’s King Abdullah: “I wish you could do more because I’m looking at the whole Gaza Strip right now and it’s a real mess, it’s a real mess.” He said he planned to make a similar request to Egypt’s president on Sunday.
He said the move “could be temporary” or “could be long-term.”
Hamas has vowed to oppose any such action and the comments are likely to anger Palestinians in Gaza, who consider the territory their ancestral home.
“We the Palestinian people in Gaza have endured 15 months of death and destruction… without leaving the land. So even though we have what appear to be good intentions under the rubric of reconstruction, even though they seem to have good intentions, as we President Trump’s proposal was announced,” Hamas politburo member Bassem Naim told the BBC.
He added: “Just as our people have thwarted all plans for displacement and replacement homes over decades, so too will projects like this be thwarted.”
Most of Gaza’s two million residents have been displaced during a 15-month war with Israel that has leveled much of Gaza’s infrastructure.
EPAThe United Nations has previously estimated that 60% of buildings throughout Gaza have been damaged or destroyed and may take decades to rebuild.
Mr. Trump made the comments while speaking with reporters aboard Air Force One.
“You’re talking about a million and a half people and we’re just cleaning up the whole thing,” he said.
“Almost everything has been demolished and people are dying there. So I would rather get involved with some Arab countries and build housing on another site and maybe they can live peacefully for a change.”
Mr. Trump provided no further details about the proposal, and the subject was not mentioned in a formal readout from the White House.
Asked about Mr Trump’s comments, Abu Yahya Rashid, a displaced man in the southern city of Khan Younis, said:
“We are the ones who decide our destiny and what we want. This land is the property of our ancestors and ancestors. We will not leave it except as corpses.”
Decades of U.S. foreign policy have been devoted to establishing a Palestinian state, of which Gaza is a key part. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reject this.
The United States has previously said it opposes any forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza or the occupied West Bank, Then Secretary of State Anthony Blink said last year: “They cannot, must not be forced to leave Gaza.”
According to the United Nations, more than 2 million Palestinian refugees, most of whom have been granted citizenship, live in Jordan. They are some of the descendants of some 750,000 Palestinians who have fled or been forced to flee their homes in the conflict that has formed around Israel.
Thousands of Palestinians have fled to Egypt since the war with Israel began, but they are not considered refugees there.
In October 2023, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi Says he rejects any forced displacement of Palestinians Going into Sinai, the only solution is an independent state for the Palestinians.
Israel’s far-right wants to return to Gaza and establish settlements there. Israel ordered a unilateral pullout in 2005 that dismantled 21 settlements and the army evacuated some 9,000 settlers.
Far-right former national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said he praised Mr Trump’s “initiative to move residents from Gaza to Jordan and Egypt.”
“One of our demands from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is to promote voluntary migration,” he wrote on X.
Mr Trump’s comments were Displaced people delayed in returning home Israel accuses Hamas of violating terms of ceasefire agreement in northern Gaza.
One man waiting anxiously told the BBC: “There is nothing there – no life, everything has been demolished.
In separate comments on Air Force One, Trump said he was done with the former president Joe Biden holds 2,000-pound bomb to Israel.
“They’re paying for them, they’ve been waiting a long time,” he told reporters on Air Force One.
The United States is by far Israel’s largest arms supplier and has helped it build one of the most technologically sophisticated militaries in the world.
But the war in Gaza has prompted new calls for the United States to reduce or end arms shipments to Israel because of the extent of damage caused by U.S. weapons in the territory.
