I disagree. This has long been a well-thought-out and detailed plan.
In February last year, Trump’s son-in-law and Chief Middle East adviser Jared Kushner gave a presentation at Harvard University showing the great real estate investment opportunities that would become available through a US plan to transform Gaza into a landscape of futuristic skyscrapers resembling Dubai (the lecture is accessible on social media for those interested).
Not surprisingly, one of those skyscrapers would be a luxury Trump Towers. The only problem was the existing inhabitants of Gaza whose presence would hamper construction and development operations. They had to be cleared out because the whole of Gaza would be turned into a construction site. It is no coincidence that Trump proposed the idea just days after taking office.
In fact, it is merely a new repackaging of the age-old transfer plan on which the establishment of the Jewish state is based. The very concept of that entity requires the forced expulsion of the Palestinian people from their ancestral lands. Its implementation en masse began in 1948, continued through subsequent confiscations, another large wave of mass displacement in 1967, and a growing stream of home demolitions, land confiscations and settlement expansion ever since.
Both Egypt and Jordan have naturally refused to collude in a process that violates UN resolutions and the Geneva Conventions and, moreover, constitutes an international war crime and crime against humanity. But, according to reports, Trump is not deterred and his administration is studying the possibility of transferring half a million Palestinians from Gaza to Indonesia, again with the ostensible purpose of clearing the way for construction and development.
They will probably go knocking on the doors of other countries in the pursuit of the population transfer scheme. The irony is that Washington is pushing this ingenious proposal at a time when it wants to deport tens of thousands of Latin American immigrants from the US.
The commentary across social media reflects the widespread popular condemnation of Trump’s madcap proposal. Many have asked why the US itself does not offer to host the Palestinians in some of its 50 states.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 6 February, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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